I 



THE POWER OF IDEALS 
IN AMERICAN HISTORY 



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THE POWER OF IDEALS 
IN AMERICAN HISTORY 



BY 



Ephraim Douglass Adams, Ph.D. 

Professor of History, 
Leland Stanford, Jr., University 




NEW HAVEN: YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 

LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD 

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 

MCMXIII 



'5 



Copyright, 1913 

BY 

Yale University Press 

First printed November, 1913, 1000 copies 



^K^yT- 



©Cf, 



ft J, . 






CONTENTS 

I Nationality — a Faith . 

II, Anti-Slavery — a Crusade 

III Manifest Destiny — an Emotion 

IV Religion — a Service 

V Democracy — a Vision . 



3 
33 
65 

97 

127 



INTRODUCTION 

The lectures hitherto given under the auspices of 
the Dodge Foundation for Citizenship have em- 
bodied the thought of distinguished men, famous 
in some field of public service, — in law, in state 
administration, or in church organization. These 
men, speaking from personal experience, have been 
able to present in didactic form, ethical standards 
of conduct. The teacher of American history will 
certainly affirm that he also has standards of con- 
duct and he naturally turns to history itself, seek- 
ing in the experience of the past great principles of 
national progress. If it can be shown that the 
American people have been largely influenced in 
their development by moral principles, or by ideals, 
it is at least a safe presumption that ideals still 
animate this nation. 

I wish then to recall to your remembrance certain 
leading ideals, powerful in their influence upon our 
history, in the past one hundred years. Before 
undertaking this, however, permit me an expla- 
nation of the reason for my choice of subject. 
There is today a very decided tendency to seek 
purely material reasons for historical development, 
and especially so, apparently, in American history. 
The causes of the American Revolution are asserted 



X INTRODUCTION 

to have been almost wholly commercial, to the 
exclusion of those ideals of political and religious 
freedom which our forefathers loudly voiced., and 
which their descendants have accepted as a creed. 
Upon this period of our history I do not propose 
to touch, but it is interesting to observe that the 
modern interpretation differs little from the con- 
temporary accusations of British writers, — as in the 
words of Thomas Moore, expressing contempt for 
sordid motives hidden under the guise of liberty. 

" Those vaunted demagogues, who nobly rose 
From England's debtors to be England's foes, 
Who could their monarch in their purse forget. 
And break allegiance, but to cancel debt." 

This seeking for the material basis of historical 
development is not indeed a new pursuit. Buckle 
expressed it in terms of geographic environment, 
"The mountains made men free." But it was 
answered, "Men who would not be slaves, who 
would be free, fled to the mountains." It may be 
that when England has become a memory, and 
Holland a myth, the advocate of geographic 
environment will find in the rocks and in the chill- 
ing mists of New England the forces that created 
the Puritan conscience, and dwarfed his emotions. 
In the sunshine and clear atmosphere of my own 
state of California, the kindly critic finds excuse 
for the unrest of its people, — and for their warm 



INTRODUCTION xi 

impulses. The motto of Stanford University, "Die 
Luft der Freiheit weht," has an intoxicating effect 
upon the Eastern tourist, and he frequently becomes 
a living testimony to the influence of geographical 
environment. Yes, "the wind of freedom is blow- 
ing," — but as one observer remarked, "It is not a 
hurricane." The ideals of California are not 
founded in geography, or in climate. They are 
founded, as elsewhere, in the spirit. 

In truth, students of American history today, 
particularly the economic specialist, and the geo- 
graphic historian, are too much inclined to claim for 
the results of their research, the attributes of an 
all-powerful, all-compelling force. The careful 
scholar, though his principal interest be industrial 
progress, makes no such claim. Bogart, in the 
preface to his "Economic History of the United 
States," says, "The keynote of all American history, 
from whatever standpoint it may be written, is 
found in the efforts of a virile and energetic people 
to appropriate and develop the wonderful natural 
resources of a new continent and there to realize 
their ideals of liberty and government." With such 
a statement there can be no quarrel ; the concluding 
phrase is indeed the major premise. But other 
writers either forget that premise, or deny it. 
Simons, a determined materialist in history, begins 
the preface of his "Social Forces in American 
History" with this assertion: 



xii INTRODUCTION 

"That political struggles are based upon eco- 
nomic interests is today disputed by few students of 
society. . . . Back of every political party there has 
always stood a group or class which expected to 
profit by the activity and the success of that party." 

And his book is an attempt to prove that through- 
out the whole course of American history, economic 
interests alone have determined political action. 
This idea is developed to the exclusion of all other 
forces. In short, he asserts the "economic man." 

It is this latter extreme contention that I wish to 
deny, — not by analysis and criticism, but by an 
appeal to the facts of our history, for a fact, a 
truth of history, may be something wholly impos- 
sible of reduction to concrete terms; it may be an 
emotion, a sentiment, or an ideal, and as such, so 
long as it is generally accepted, even though it be 
directly contrary to economic interests, it may be 
an all-powerful spring of conduct, and the prime 
cause of political action. The "economic man" is 
a fiction. Over seventy-five years ago, here at Yale, 
in a Phi Beta Kappa address, Horace Bushnell 
denied that such a man, as the sole moving cause 
of history, had any real existence. "There is," he 
said, "a whole side of society and human life which 
does not trade," and which "wields, in fact, a 
mightier power over the public prosperity itself just 
because it reaches higher and connects with nobler 
ends." 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

This is not to deny, nor does any one deny, the 
influence of industries and of geography, in national 
growth. All that I wish to express is that there 
are other influences of an intellectual, — it may be 
a spiritual, — character, and, in a time of undue 
emphasis upon the materialism of American history, 
to recall to your memory a few of the great ideals 
that have animated our national conduct and 
moulded our destiny. I shall attempt neither 
explanation nor analysis of these ideals, but rather 
shall seek to show by straightforward historical 
review and by familiar quotations from leading 
Americans of the time, the force that was in them. 
Therefore I have called these lectures "The Power 
of Ideals in American History," and the topics to 
be treated are Nationality, Anti-Slavery, Manifest 
Destiny, Religion, and Democracy. 



YALE LECTURES ON THE 
RESPONSIBILITIES OF CITIZENSHIP 



THE POWER OF IDEALS IN 
AMERICAN HISTORY 



I 

NATIONALITY— A FAITH 



I 

NATIONALITY— A FAITH 

A nation is defined as "a people associated 
together and organized under one civil government, 
and ordinarily dwelling together in a distinct terri- 
tory." Nationality implies a sense by such a people 
of their independence and their unity, with the 
patriotic determination to preserve these conditions. 
In the present time, it is difficult to think in terms 
not national, whether we regard Europe or America. 
But one hundred years ago this was far from true. 
England, France, and Spain, alone of the great 
powers of Europe, possessed the conditions and the 
spirit of nationality. The evidence of that spirit 
was abroad, however, and nationality is rightly 
held to have been the most powerful ideal of the 
nineteenth century. More than any other force 
it wrecked Napoleon's dream of an empire of 
Western Europe, and as one looks at Vincenzo 
Vela's wonderful marble, "The Last Days of Napo- 
leon," in the Corcoran Art Gallery, one wonders 
whether the feeble invalid, with the map of Europe 
spread upon his knees, whose eyes seem visioning 
what might have been, may not have recognized at 
last the force, the ideal, that had defeated him. 



4, THE POWER OF IDEALS 

In America, the ideal of our revolutionary fathers 
was independence. But it was not national inde- 
pendence. Each colony jealously guarded its sense 
of separate existence, and independence from Great 
Britain once assured, each state, in spite of the 
forms of a wider nation, maintained its sover- 
eignty. Difficulties at home and dangers from 
abroad forced the adoption of the Constitution of 
1787. There were a few men in the convention, 
and a few also in the country at large, who rejoiced 
in this first step toward American nationality. 
Timothy Dwight, later to be one of the greatest 
of Yale's distinguished line of presidents, was 
inspired to address the constitutional convention of 
1787 in a poem beginning with these lines : 

" Be then your counsels, as your subject, great, 
A world their sphere, and time's long reign their date. 
Each party-view, each private good, disclaim. 
Each petty maxim, each colonial aim ; 
Let all Columbia's weal your views expand, 
A mighty system rule a mighty land." 

But such visions, such an ideal, were not felt by 
the mass of men. Timothy Dwight in all his views 
and policies has been rightly described as "an 
earnest of the nineteenth century," — a forerunner 
of his times. The constitution, said John Quincy 
Adams, was "extorted from the grinding neces- 
sity of a reluctant nation," and these words, save 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 5 

that there was no nation, accurately depict con- 
temporary attitude. In view of the later "worship 
of the constitution," it is hard to realize that there 
was a long period when the spirit of independence, 
the fear of a centralized government, made men 
suspicious of, and even opposed to, a real American 
unity. Nearly ten years later, Washington, in his 
farewell address of 1796, gave three lines to the 
topic "liberty," taking it for granted that love 
of liberty was securely planted in the hearts of the 
people, while nearly one fifth of the entire address 
was devoted to arguments showing the value of a 
permanent Union of the states. This was indeed 
his central thought, evidence of his fear of a new 
separation of the states. 

I shall not follow, step by step, the growth of 
the sense of American nationality. It was a 
gradual development, hastened at the last by the 
patriotic fervor evoked in the second war with 
England, — the War of 1812. Defeated though we 
were in that war, our capitol burnt, our ports 
blockaded, our shipping driven from the seas, we 
emerged triumphant, not because of our success 
in a few naval duels, or of Jackson's belated victory 
at New Orleans, but because, cutting loose from 
all dependence on European alliances, trusting in 
our right, and exhibiting our willingness to fight 
for right, we had given notice to the world that 
we were a nation. But the greater triumph was 



6 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

over ourselves. By 1815 the sense of nationality 
was established, — not so firmly as to escape grave 
danger in the future, — but still sufficiently estab- 
lished to have become a recognized ideal. To the 
astonishment of the oldtime conservatives, and to 
the dismay of many a politician accustomed to play 
upon the local jealousies of the people, there had 
arisen a belief in national destiny, a sense of remote- 
ness from older nations and older customs, a con- 
sciousness of a separate and distinct existence for 
America, in short, an ideal of unity and of nation- 
ality. Let us see what force this ideal had, how it 
was expressed, what its influence was, in our later 
history. 

The Monroe Doctrine of 1823, warning European 
powers that the United States regarded the Ameri- 
can continents as no longer subject to colonization, 
and protesting against a concert of action to aid 
Spain in recovering her revolted dependencies, was 
a notice served upon the world that we had become 
a nation. This was the application of a new ideal 
to conditions outside our territory. But the real 
test of the new force came from within, when it 
was brought in conflict with the divergent interests 
of different sections. When separate states lose 
their individuality in union, when a nation comes 
into actual being, one of the most vital evidences 
of that union is found in the willingness to adopt 
a general, rather than a local, system of taxation. 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 7 

Thus the question of federal taxation in the United 
States early assumed an importance greater than 
the mere matter of revenue. A tariff system on 
imports promised to give needed revenue without 
great friction, and in its original application there 
was little thought of the relation to national con- 
sciousness. But steadily, after 1815, a tariff for 
revenue was expanded into a protective tariff, and 
became identified with the ideal of nationality. 
Clay, the father of the cry for "home markets," 
sought to popularize his financial policy, by calling 
it the "American system" — inaccurately differen- 
tiating it from a "European system." With the 
truth or falsity of his financial theories or his terms 
I have here no concern. The essential thing is that 
the cry "American system" was effective, — that it 
brought votes, and that it gave to the protection 
of home industries a support vastly greater than 
could have been derived from those directly and 
consciously benefited by protection. The speeches 
in Congress and on the stump urged protective 
duties on the score of public revenue, of direct 
benefit, and of a separate and distinct national ideal, 
and the last argument usually predominated. The 
materialistic writer of American history sees in the 
adoption of a protective system merely the play of 
industrial interests, nor is it to be denied that these 
industrial interests were powerful. But the fact 
must not be lost sight of that the ideal of nation- 



8 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

ality was used to support the system, that its being 
so used is proof of a popular identification of pro- 
tection with nationaHty, and above all that when 
an industrial interest in 1830, opposed to protective 
duties, forced a renunciation of the theory of pro- 
tection, there was brought out the most eloquent 
expression yet voiced of a belief in nationality, and 
the most determined action yet taken in support 
of it. 

In 1816 a tariff had been enacted, protective in 
its nature, yet intended primarily to raise revenue. 
In 1824, after a moderate increase of rates in 
various years, the "American system" had come 
into its own, and the protective principle was defi- 
nitely adopted as expressing the "American idea." 
And in 1828, partly through the madness of the 
protected industries, partly through political chi- 
canery on the part of the supporters of Andrew 
Jackson's presidential candidacy, there had been 
enacted a tariff so high that it was known as the 
""Tariff of Abominations," — so high indeed that 
many a man hitherto voting for protection, because 
he had been taught to identify it with nationality, 
began to question and to doubt. 

One section of the United States received little 
of the benefit, and felt much of the burden of this 
protective system. The South felt that it was 
being sacrificed to the rest of the Union, and in 
the South there was one man, John C. Calhoun, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 9 

so clear of vision that he saw in the growth of 
the ideal of nationality the loss of the independence 
of the states, — the loss, as he truly believed, of 
liberty, for liberty to him meant the freedom of 
his own state. South Carolina, to guard absolutely 
her own interests, to control her own destiny. Pro- 
tection and nationality were identified, then, both 
by those who supported and those who opposed the 
protective system. Calhoun struck at protection 
both in the industrial interests of South Carolina, 
and to defend her liberty, and the "Tariff of 
Abominations" gave him his cause and his oppor- 
tunity. His answer was the famous "Exposition" 
of Nullification, and the action of his state. 

Calhoun's theory of the relation of the states and 
the federal government rested upon the assumption 
.that the constitution had been adopted by the 
sovereign states and that these states were still 
sovereign. The constitution thus viewed as a com- 
pact between states, he then asserted that each state, 
if she considered a law passed by the federal Con- 
gress not warranted under the constitution, had a 
right to declare that law unconstitutional, and to 
nullify its operation within her own boundaries. 
This, said Calhoun, is not secession, though it was 
clearly seen that the "right" of nullification must 
include ultimately the "right" of secession. But 
Calhoun's main thesis was the preservation of lib- 
erty, and not only the right, but the duty, of the 



10 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

states to preserve their liberty against the encroach- 
ments of the nation. Liberty versus NationaHty! 
This was the essence of the nulHfication contro- 
versy, and when Hayne of South Carolina, speak- 
ing in the United States Senate, outlined the theory 
of nullification, attacked the protected interests of 
the North and especially the selfishness of New 
England, threatened that his state would be forced 
to action, and pictured her as a defender of liberty, 
he gave opportunity for passionate expression in 
reply of the ideal of nationality. Webster eagerly 
seized the opportunity, and in his famous "Reply to 
Hayne," January 26, 1830, sounded the deepest, 
most inspiring note of all his oratory. It was not 
a great speech in its logic, in its argument for pro- 
tection, in its constitutional theory, or even in its 
defense of the good name of Massachusetts; its 
greatness and its appeal, then and now, rested 
wholly in its assertion of the sentiment of nation- 
ality, and of a patriotism wider and higher than 
mere state patriotism. 

"I shall not acknowledge," he said, "that the 
honorable member goes before me in regard for 
whatever of distinguished talent or distinguished 
character South Carolina has produced, I claim 
part of the honor, I partake in the pride of her 
great names. I claim them for my countrymen, 
one and all, the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the 
Pinckneys, the Sumpters, the Marions, — Americans 
all, whose fame is no more to be hemmed in by 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 11 

State lines than their talents and patriotism were 
capable of being circumscribed within the same 
narrow limits." 

But it was in his peroration that Webster struck 
the true note of nationality: 

"I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond 
the Union to see what might lie hidden in the dark 
recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the 
chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that 
unite us together shall be broken asunder. L have 
not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice 
of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, 
I can fathom the depth of the abyss below; . . . 
when my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last 
time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining 
on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once 
glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, 
belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or 
drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their 
last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the 
gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now known and 
honored throughout the earth, still full high ad- 
vanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their 
original lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted, not 
a single star obscured, bearing for its motto no such 
miserable interrogatory as 'What is all this worth?' 
nor those other words of delusion and folly, 
'Liberty first and Union afterward'; but every- 
where, spread all over in characters of living light, 
blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over 
the sea and over the land, and in every wind under 
the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to 



12 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

every true American heart, — Liberty and Union, 
now and forever, one and inseparable." 

We must not, however, overestimate the imme- 
diate effect of, or the general acquiescence in, these 
stirring words. They were heard with emotion by 
some, with derision by others, though all felt for 
the moment the spell of Webster's eloquence. One 
section of the people applauded either with intense 
conviction, or from pride in the orator, but another 
section saw in this speech justification for its fear 
of a centralized government. It was not until long 
after Webster's death that North and West were 
wholly united in the determination to maintain that 
ideal nationality which Webster had voiced. For 
the moment indeed there was a feeling, as Benton 
asserted, that Webster had overstated a crisis, to 
arouse a popular outcry against South Carolina. 
But South Carolina was not intimidated. Finding 
her threats of nullification unheeded, she went on 
to action, and her legislature prohibited the collec- 
tion of federal customs dues within her borders. 
It was then that Andrew Jackson, representing 
much more truly than did Webster, the opinion 
of the people of the United States, also expressed 
his adherence to an ideal of nationality and his 
determination, as President of the United States, 
to use force, if necessary, in maintaining that ideal. 
In a proclamation on December 19, 1832, a com- 
prehensive argument against the theory of nullifi- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 13 

cation, he mingled pleading with threat, but threat 
was its burden. He asserted the interests of the 
Union to be superior to the interests of the state, 
and his language appealed, as he intended it should 
appeal, to the sentiment of nationality, as something 
worth fighting for. 

"I consider, then," he wrote, "the power to 
annul a law of the United States, assumed by one 
State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, 
contradicted expressly by the letter of the Consti- 
tution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with 
every principle on which it was founded, and 
destructive of the great object for which it was 
formed." 



"Our Constitution does not contain the absurdity 
of giving power to make laws, and another power 
to resist them. . . . The Constitution is still the 
object of our reverence, the bond of our Union, 
our defence in danger, the source of our prosperity 
and peace." 

And Jackson notified South Carolina that he would 
use the forces of the United States to compel 
obedience to a law of the United States. 

The threat was not carried into execution, for 
there was compromise on the tariff. Clay, the 
creator of the "American system," but always, first 
and foremost, a disciple of nationality, yielded his 
protective principles, and introduced a measure. 



14 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

which gave, as was said, "a lease of nine years to 
protection, and then the end of that doctrine." 
Calhoun, claiming this a victory for South Caro- 
lina, and yet fearful of Jackson's "ferocity" also, 
accepted the compromise, but to the end protested 
that South Carolina had stood for principle — not 
profit merely. "Disguise it as you may," he said, 
"the controversy is one between power and liberty," 
and in that, as he defined the terms, he was abso- 
lutely right. But for "power," Webster and Jack- 
son, and all the popular opinion that backed 
Jackson's threat, read "Nationality," — and thus 
reading, gave evidence of their faith in an ideal. 
That ideal was not yet an universal American faith, 
but it had found expression as never before in the 
nullification controversy, and every year added to 
its strength. 

Upon the development of the ideal of nationality 
for the period between the nullification struggle and 
the Civil War, I do not dwell, since it was in this 
period that other ideals, notably those of anti- 
slavery, and of manifest destiny, topics to be con- 
sidered in subsequent lectures, more openly held 
public attention. Yet nationality was inextricably 
interwoven with both, and the questions of perma- 
nent union and of nationality, as opposed by ideals 
of state liberty, gained steadily in intensity. During 
this period the South largely imposed its leadership 
and control upon national policy, and so long as it 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 15 

could do this, was content to let the older issue 
sleep. With the growth of Northern sentiment 
against slavery, and of Southern determination to 
maintain it, there sprang up in the minds of extreme 
anti-slavery advocates a feeling that the Union, as 
it stood, was a moral offense, that the North should 
withdraw from that Union, in short, an anti- 
nationalistic sentirnent. This was the expression, 
however, of but a few rabid leaders. For a 
moment, when Texas was annexed, increasing the 
power of the slave states, and when this was fol- 
lowed by the war with Mexico, even the more 
moderate of the anti-slavery leaders turned to the 
idea of separation. Lowell, in the first number of 
his famous "Biglow Papers," in 1846, expresses it 
in the lines : 

" Ef I'd my way I had ruther 

We should go to work an' part, 
They take one way, we take t'other, 
Guess it wouldn't break my heart ;" 

But this feeling did not last, and in his later 
"Biglow Papers," he quickly changed the note, 
using his genius in a sharp arraignment of Southern 
ideals, especially of the asserted benefits of slavery 
to the slave, as well as in attack upon the injustice 
to Mexico of the war. The personal note in these 
poems is one of almost bitter despair and pessimism, 
yet in the end he reasserted in possibly his most 



16 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

famous lines, his faith in the ultimate triumph of 
high principles and ideals. 

" Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the 

throne ; 
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim 

unknown 
Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above 

his own." 

It is, how^ever, in the Civil War that this ideal 
of nationality at last asserted itself as the most 
powerful influence in all our history. Before that 
fratricidal struggle had actually begun, there were 
many in the North who, with sorrow for the im- 
pending separation, yet nevertheless could not tol- 
erate the thought of an appeal to arms to preserve 
the Union. Oliver Wendell Holmes, in a "Lament 
for Sister Caroline," wrote: 

" Go, then, our rash sister, afar and aloof, — 
Run wild in the sunshine away from our roof; 
But when your heart aches and your feet have grown 

sore, 
Remember the pathway that leads to our door !" 

But even in these lines Holmes reveals his faith in 
the ultimate victory of the nationalistic ideal, and 
when the news came of the attack on Fort Sumter, 
he, with all who had doubted, was suddenly trans- 
formed into an ardent patriot, ready, if need be, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 17 

to sacrifice his all for the preservation of the Union. 
The memoirs and autobiographies of that day, one 
and all, bear witness to the marvelous change that 
took place in the sentiments of the North, when 
the news came from Charleston. From the time 
of the election of Lincoln, in November, 1860, to the 
attack on Sumter, all had been doubt, confusion, 
uncertainty, even regret for Lincoln's victory at 
the polls. Suddenly this atmosphere of pessimism 
and dismay was cleared away by a specific act, 
raising a specific question, — the question of pre- 
serving the Union, — of preserving the ideal of 
nationality. 

It has been my good fortune while at Yale to 
secure from Professor Lounsbury a statement of 
his experiences in New York City in 1861, a portion 
of which I here present as illustrating this sudden 
change in sentiment. Professor Lounsbury writes : 

"During the months of January and February, 
as I remember. Booth was playing at the old Winter 
Garden theater. One piece he frequently acted was 
Richelieu. That I went to hear one evening in the 
early part of February. In it occurs a passage in 
which Richelieu is represented as saying: 

' Take away the sword. 
States can be saved without it.' 

As this was uttered the audience went into a trans- 
port of enthusiasm. Not merely was there a thun- 



18 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

der of applause, but hats were thrown into the air, 
and individuals might be said to have almost 
screamed with excitement and enthusiasm. Every 
one was thinking of the differences that then pre- 
vailed and the controversies that were going on, 
and the audience was proclaiming its hostility to 
any suggestion of war between the two sections. 
Booth gave up his engagements at the theater for 
the time being, but sometime in April, I think, 
returned to it to begin another. It was during 
this second engagement that the attack on Fort 
Sumter was made. I again went to hear him. 
When it came to the passage previously welcomed 
with such thunderous applause, there was preserved 
a dead silence. It passed without notice. But in 
the previous act there was a conversation between 
Richelieu and his confidant, the Capuchin Joseph. 
In that, words were spoken which the first time I 
heard the play had been received in silence. Riche- 
lieu had been represented as saying: 

* First employ 
All methods to conciliate.' 

" 'Failing then ?' inquires Joseph. To this Richelieu 
answers fiercely, 'All means to crush.' This passage 
was now hailed with a tremendous uproar. The 
same scene was enacted as had taken place at the 
previous representation, when the other passage had 
been spoken, and this time with even a more 
tempestuous welcome." 

Another description of this marvelous change in 
Northern sentiment is that given by Carl Schurz. 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 19 

He had just returned from Washington to Wis- 
consin, when the news came of the attack on Fort 
Sumter, and of the President's call for volunteers. 
Schurz hastened back to Washington. Of this 
journey he writes: 

"When only a short time before I had traveled 
from Washington westward, a dreadful gloom of 
expectancy seemed to oppress the whole country. 
Passengers in the railway cars talked together in 
murmurs, as if afraid of the sound of their own 
voices. At the railroad stations stood men with 
anxious faces waiting for the newspapers, which 
they hastily opened to read the headings, and then 
handed the papers to another with sighs of dis- 
appointment. Multitudes of people seemed to be 
perplexed not only as to what they might expect, 
but also as to what they wished. And now what 
a change! Every railroad station filled with an 
excited crowd hurrahing for the Union and Lincoln. 
The Stars and Stripes fluttering from numberless 
staffs. 

"It is impossible to describe the electric effect 
these occurrences produced upon the popular mind 
in the Northern States. Until the first gun was 
fired upon Fort Sumter many patriotic people still 
entertained a lingering hope of saving the Union 
without a conflict of arms. Now civil war had 
suddenly become a certainty. The question of what 
might have been utterly vanished before the ques- 
tion of what was to be. A mighty shout arose that 
the Republic must be saved at any cost. It was one 
of those sublime moments of patriotic exaltation 
when everybody seems willing to do everything and 



20 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

to sacrifice everything for a common cause — one of 
those ideal sun-bursts in the history of nations."* 

Let me cite still another observer, of cooler 
temperament, and more philosophic mind. I quote 
the words of Emerson: 

"At the darkest hour in the history of the repub- 
lic, when it looked as if the nation would be dis- 
membered, pulverized into its original elements, the 
attack on Fort Sumter chrystallized the North into 
a unit, and the hope of mankind was saved." 

What was this force that could "chrystallize" a 
people, could make it a unit in action? Was it a 
fear of industrial benefit about to be lost? or the 
assertion of economic principles? or a belief in the 
evils of slavery? or a conviction on a theory of the 
constitution ? It was none of these. Rather a blow 
struck at the emblem of an ideal had suddenly 
revealed to a troubled people the place that ideal 
held in their hearts. The issue was clear at last, 
the long days of anxious waiting were over, and 
everywhere, in all parties and all factions, there 
was felt the will to preserve the Union. Other 
objects were forgotten, constitutional argument was 
ignored, and simply the sense of country, of 
nationality, rose supreme. 

* These paragraphs are in inverse order in Schurz. 
Reminiscences II, 223-224. 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 21 

As the war progressed, other ideals and objects 
came to be expressed also, but throughout, the ideal 
of nationality was the dominant one in the North. 
Very early in the struggle those who had stood for 
the cause of anti-slavery believed that the war 
would not end without the extinction of that hated 
system. Lowell, who at the opening of the Mexican 
War, had doubted the permanence of the Union, 
now wrote, January 6, 1862, in a new series of the 
"Biglow Papers," his poem entitled "Jo^^^than to 
John," addressed indeed to Great Britain, and 
expressing America's resentment of British action 
in the Trent affair, but concluding with lines 
expressing his faith in nationality and in ideals 
triumphant. 

" God means to make this land, John, 
Clear thru, from sea to sea, 
Believe an' understand, John, 
The wuth o' bein' free. 

Ole Uncle S. sez he, *I guess 
God's price is high,' sez he; 
'But nothin' else than wut he sells 
Wears long, an' thet J. B. 
May larn, like you an' me !' " 

This was a prediction of emancipation. Julia Ward 
Howe tells us in her recollections, that, visiting 
Washington, she was distressed to find the soldiers 
singing the doggerel of "John Brown's Body," and 
wishing to provide words for the music, more suit- 



22 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

able and more inspiring, wrote the "Battle Hymn 
of the Republic." That poem, as Kipling has well 
said, is a "terrible" one. It is filled with the wrath 
of God, and the joy of self-sacrifice, while in the 
line, 

" As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men 
free," 

the author stated her conception of the object of 
the war. 

Nor was Mrs. Howe the only writer who sought 
to replace the words of the soldiers' song with lines 
more refined and, as it was thought, more suitable 
to the conflict. Edna Dean Proctor attempted this 
in the poem, "John Brown," suited to the rhythm 
of the song: 

" John Brown died on the scaffold for the slave ; 
Dark was the hour when we dug his hallowed grave ; 
Now God avenges the Hfe he gladly gave. 
Freedom reigns today !" 

All three of these poems were written before Lin- 
coln's emancipation proclamation had been issued, 
but, in spite of the hopes of their authors, the latter 
two were not sung by the Northern armies. The 
"Battle Hymn of the Republic," an expression of 
real genius and intense feeling, then, as now, 
aroused the emotions, but the testimony of the sol- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 23 

diers themselves is that they sang ''John Brown's 
Body" for its marching swing and for its sentiment, 
and it is to be noted that, as originally sung, it 
contained no reference to the slave, except the 
repetition of the name, "John Brown." In fact, the 
verses emphatically preferred by the soldier in the 
ranks, were: 

" They'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree," 

and 

" Now for the Union let's give three rousing cheers." 

These lines really expressed to the army the ideal 
for which it was fighting, and in them were bitter- 
ness toward those who would disrupt the Union, 
as well as determination to save it. 

It was Lincoln, however, who with that pith and 
brevity in which he had no equal, best expressed 
the ideal of nationality, paramount to all other 
ideals in this conflict. By the summer of 1862 it 
had become clear that the dream of a short war 
was but a dream. Anti-slavery sentiment in the 
North gained strength, partly from conviction, 
partly from a desire to punish the South, partly 
from a belief in emancipation as a necessary war 
measure. Horace Greeley, the influential editor of 
the New York Tribune, addressed an editorial to 
Lincoln, naming it "The Prayer of 20,000,000 



24 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

People," and urging the issue of an edict of eman- 
cipation. Lincoln wrote and made public a reply. 
After waiving discussion of many misstatements in 
Greeley's "Prayer," he said : 

"If there be those who would not save the Union, 
unless they could at the same time save slavery, I 
do not agree with them. 

"If there be those who would not save the Union, 
unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, 
I do not agree with them. 

''My paramount object is to save the Union, and 
not either to save or destroy slavery. 

"If I could save the Union without freeing any 
slaves, I would do it. And if I could save it by 
freeing all the slaves, I would do it. And if I could 
save it by freeing some, and leaving others alone, 
I would also do that. 

"What I do about slavery and the colored race, 
I do because I believe it helps to save the Union, 
and what I forbear, I forbear, because I do not 
believe it would help save the Union." 

At the moment when Lincoln wrote these words, 
so truly representative of the will of the people, 
there was lying in his desk the draft of the Emanci- 
pation Proclamation, to be issued if, in the exigen- 
cies of war, it should seem wise to issue it, as a 
war measure. The liberty of the slaves appealed 
to the "great emancipator," but far higher was the 
appeal of nationality. 

The ideal of unity, of nationality, was not con- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 25 

fined to the North. The Civil War has been 
depicted as a contest between the ideals of national 
unity and state liberty, and in its inception and 
theoretical basis this is no doubt true. Lee's per- 
sonal struggle, his self-examination, as to where 
duty lay, was typical of the reasoned, not merely 
the emotional forces, that led men to stand by their 
states. But the conflict had barely begun when, 
by the requirements of war, state liberty, even in 
the Confederacy, had to yield to national unity, and 
this ideal of a Southern unity found expression in 
the literature of the South. In Albert Pike's poem, 
"Dixie," there is no note of the liberty of the state. 
The very first verse is a call to country : 

" Southrons, hear your country call you ! 
Up, lest worse than death befall you ! 

To arms ! To arms ! To arms, in Dixie ! 
Lo ! all the beacon-fires are lighted, — 
Let all hearts be now united ! 
To arms ! To arms ! To arms ! in Dixie ! 
Advance the flag of Dixie ! 
For Dixie's land we take our stand, 
And live and die for Dixie!" 

and faith in divine guidance was not wanting either, 
as in the verse : 

" Swear upon your country's altar 
Never to submit or falter, 
Till the spoilers are defeated, 
Till the Lord's work is completed!" 



26 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

It is a remarkable fact that in the earUer period 
of the war, while at the North there existed, and 
was much expression of, intense bitterness, and soon 
of a desire to punish the South for forcing the con- 
flict, in the South, neither statesman nor poet gave 
voice to sentiments of revenge. This may have 
been due to a conviction of victory bred in the 
South, or possibly to an underlying sentiment of 
regret that she had been compelled to strike a blow 
at the "once glorious Union." But as the war 
dragged on, and the issue became more doubtful 
for the independence of a Southern nation, — when 
indeed the South began to suffer, then came the 
expression of a desire to inflict suffering. Henry 
Timrod, in the "Cotton Boll," a dreamy contem- 
plation of the virtues of cotton production, and its 
many blessings, suddenly turns, toward the close of 
his poem, to a fervent appeal for divine aid in 
avenging the South as a nation: 

" Oh, help us, Lord ! to roll the crimson flood 
Back on its course, and, while our banners wing 
Northward, strike with us ! till the Goth shall cling 
To his own blasted altar-stones, and crave 
Mercy; and we shall grant it, and dictate 
The lenient future of his fate 

There, where some rolling ships and crumbling quays 
Shall one day mark the Port which ruled the Western 
seas." 

The Civil War began indeed, as Calhoun had 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 27 

feared, in a conflict between ''power and liberty," 
nationality and states' rights. The result of the war 
settled for all time that question. The ideal of 
nationality triumphed because it had back of it a 
superior material force, — an argument of the mate- 
rialistic historian, — but that force could never have 
been exerted had it not been for a united idealiza- 
tion of nationality. In the later ready acceptance 
of that same ideal by the South, is to be read in 
the South itself, even throughout the struggle, 
perhaps even renewed by the struggle, a subcon- 
scious acceptance of the binding power of the ideal 
of nationality. In times of national danger, genius 
in literary expression finds inspiration in patriotism. 
The popular approval of such expressions is one 
evidence, and an important one, of a nation's faith. 
During the Civil War Edward Everett Hale wrote 
that wonderful story, "The Man Without a Coun- 
try," and it at once held the hearts of the North 
as did no other writing of the time. But more 
recently, in the Spanish-American War, and since, 
that story has been reprinted, especially in the 
South, and read again and again, as if it were 
new, as indeed it always will be new to American 
hearts. It is simply a confession of faith in the 
ideal of nationality. In concluding this lecture, 
permit me then to recall the narrative and quote 
the closing paragraph. 

The hero of the story is Philip Nolan, a young 



28 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

army officer stationed in the West at the beginning 
of the nineteenth century, who falls a victim to the 
magnetism of Aaron Burr, joins the supposed plan 
for a new western empire, and forgets his duty and 
his loyalty to his native land. While being tried 
for treason in 1807 Nolan, angered by some ques- 
tion of the presiding judge, "cried out in a fit of 
frenzy, 'Damn the United States! I wish I may 
never hear of the United States again.' " The old 
judge was shocked beyond expression, and when 
Nolan was convicted, condemned him to the literal 
execution of his own wish, "never to hear the name 
of the United States again." He was placed as a 
perpetual prisoner on board a United States naval 
vessel, officers and crew were instructed to treat 
him kindly, but were never to mention to him, or 
to permit him information about, the United States, 
and as he was transferred from vessel to vessel, 
these same orders were enforced, though Nolan, 
at first defiant, soon sought, by entreaty, stratagem, 
or bribes, to be told something of his country, but 
all in vain. Thus situated, he went through the 
war of 1812, cruised many times about the globe 
but was never permitted to enter an American 
port, passed through the Mexican War, found new 
faces always, grew old, his story almost forgotten, 
while naval commanders, in the cradle when he was 
condemned, continued to carry out the instructions 
of 1807. At last, during the Civil War, on May 11, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 29 

1863, dying, he excited the compassion of Captain 
Danforth, who commanded the vessel on which 
Nolan then was, and Danforth visited Nolan in his 
stateroom, yielded to his entreaties and poured into 
his eager ears the story of his country's history, — 
of the war of 1812, of the acquisition of Florida, 
of Texas and California, and of Oregon. Danforth 
told him of industries, of railroads, and of cities; 
of books, and colleges, of West Point and the 
Naval School. Together the two drew in, upon a 
map that Nolan had long since constructed in vague 
and uncertain outline, seventeen new states added to 
the Union since Nolan had been condemned never 
again to hear of his country. 

"And," says Danforth, "he drank it in, and 
enjoyed it as I cannot tell you. He grew more and 
more silent, yet I never thought he was tired or 
faint. I gave him a glass of water, but he just wet 
his lips, and told me not to go away. Then he 
asked me to bring the Presbyterian 'Book of Public 
Prayer,' which lay there, and said with a smile, 
that it would open at the right place, — and so it 
did. There was his double red mark down the 
page; and I knelt down and read, and he repeated 
with me : 'For ourselves and our country, O gra- 
cious God, we thank thee that notwithstanding our 
manifold transgressions of thy holy laws, thou hast 
continued to us thy marvelous kindness,' — and so 
to the end of that thanksgiving. Then he turned 
to the end of the same book, and I read the words 
more familiar to me: 'Most heartily we beseech 



30 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

thee with thy favor to behold and bless thy servant 
the President of the United States, and all others 
in authority,' — and the rest of the Episcopal collect 
'Danforth,' said he, 'I have repeated those prayers 
night and morning, it is now fifty-five years.' And 
then he said he would go to sleep. . . . And I went 
away." 



II 

ANTI-SLAVERY— A CRUSADE 



II 

ANTI-SLAVERY— A CRUSADE 

It is now generally conceded that while anti- 
slavery attracted attention and discussion previous 
to 1860, it had no such hold on the people as to 
preclude other interests, and that its influence in 
bringing on the war has been overestimated. Imme- 
diately after the Civil War, indeed, popular retro- 
spect pictured the North as long in the grip of anti- 
slavery sentiment, and men were prone to think of 
themselves as animated in 1850 by the same ideals 
they later held in 1865. Modern historians have 
corrected this error, but today the correction has 
itself assumed the proportions of an error. Instead 
of a just estimate of the real influence of the anti- 
slavery movement, we have now a tendency to deny 
both its actual extent, and its force as an ideal. 
Recently, at the American Historical Association 
in Boston, 1912, one of the speakers affirmed his 
belief that careful investigation of church history 
between 1840 and 1860 would show that the general 
sentiment of church members and church organi- 
zations in the North was definitely inimical to the 
anti-slavery movement, thus denying its force as 
an ideal in religious bodies. An able student of 



34 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

history in its geographic conditions has written as 
follows : 

"The morale of the institution [slavery] like the 
right of secession, was long a mooted question, until 
New England, having discovered the economic un- 
fitness of slave industry to her boulder-strewn soil, 
took the lead in the crusade against it." 

Here is no denial that anti-slavery was an ideal and 
a force, but the inception of that ideal is found in 
geographic environment. An economic historian, 
in a chapter entitled "Why the Civil War came," 
goes much farther than most writers. He states 
that the causes of the war were not "found either 
in the wickedness of chattel slavery, nor in the 
growing moral consciousness of the North. ... It 
is certain that the general moral conscience of the 
North had seldom been lower than in the years 
when competitive capitalism [1840 to 1860] was 
gaining the mastery in American industrial life." 

These citations are sufficient to indicate the pres- 
ent tendency to minimize in our history the force 
of the anti-slavery ideal, or to deny its spiritual 
vigor. I believe these interpretations, or explana- 
tions, to be true only in part, that these were con- 
tributing rather than conclusive causes, and that 
back of the sordid, tangible explanation was an 
inspiring sentiment that touched men's hearts and 
fired imagination. In support of my contention, I 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 35 

wish to present to you, as before, a few quotations 
illustrative of the origin, growth, and influence of 
the anti-slavery ideal. 

Historically considered, I believe that opposition 
to slavery among Christian nations had its origin 
in the teachings of Christ, and that when men's 
minds turned from theological dogma to consider 
life and service, there emerged an antagonism to 
slavery. In America, it was in fact exactly in 
those religious communities where the brotherhood 
of man was most insisted on that anti-slavery sen- 
timent first appeared. This was among the Quakers 
and in pre-revolutionary times. African slavery 
existed in all the American colonies, and it can not 
be said that in colonial times there was any general 
feeling against it. But when the doctrines of the 
Declaration of Independence, as understood by the 
majority of men, came to reinforce religious hos- 
tility, there immediately sprang up a number of 
definitely organized anti-slavery societies. By 1827 
slavery had been abolished in all the Northern 
states, while societies for the further expansion of 
the movement had been organized in every state 
in the Union, except in the extreme South, in 
Indiana, and in New England. 

This earlier movement was largely moral and 
religious. Its chief center of activity and its chief 
support were in the so-called border states, espe- 
cially in Kentucky and in Virginia, and here the 



36 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

conviction existed that slavery was a moral evil. 
Previous to 1830 the great advocate of emancipa- 
tion was a Quaker, Benjamin Lundy, who traveled 
freely though the South, and was kindly received. 
But between 1827 and 1830 the movement grad- 
ually lost its hold upon the people. This rapid 
decay of a campaign of ideals, has always excited 
the wonder of the historian, and various reasons 
have been asserted for it, — reasons which I may 
not pause to examine, but it is worthy of notice 
that in the whole civilized world the period of the 
late twenties was one of apathy to ideals. In 
Europe this was manifested in political reaction 
against the ideals of the French Revolution, — in 
the loss of younger enthusiasms, — a moral stagna- 
tion not recovered from till the revolutions of 1830, 
which had their origin in a remembrance of the 
things that were good in the revolution of 1789. 
In America the same wave, or germ, call it what 
you will, of intellectual and spiritual unrest, ex- 
pressed itself in various forms, one of which was 
the new abolition movement initiated by William 
Lloyd Garrison. 

Garrisonian abolition may be traced in part to 
the older movement, but it also differed materially 
from it. While the earlier agitation urged eman- 
cipation for slaves, based upon religious conviction, 
the new gospel demanded freedom for slaves upon 
all grounds, moral, social, and political. In place 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 37 

of an ethical question came a positive command. 
Denunciation was substituted for moral suasion. 
"Thou shalt not" displaced the older *'it is better 
not." The new gospel proclaimed that the nation, 
if it would save its soul, must not hold slaves. Gar- 
rison placarded slavery as a damnable wrong, and 
slave owners as doomed to damnation, unless they 
forswore slavery, while the Northerner was first 
appealed to to join in placing this stigma upon 
slavery, and refusing, was condemned as particeps 
criminis. Not all anti-slavery leaders held such 
extreme views, yet from the first the movement 
assumed the proportions of a moral crusade, and 
its converts were impelled by an ideal. Let us 
examine its expressions, and estimate their actual 
influence. 

Convinced that Lundy's milder methods had been 
ineffective and useless, Garrison in 1830 came to 
Boston and established the Liberator. In the first 
issue of that paper he stated his purpose : 

"I shall strenuously contend for the immediate 
enfranchisement of our slave population. ... I am 
aware that many object to the severity of my lan- 
guage; but is there not cause for severity? I will 
be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as 
justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, 
or speak, or write, with moderation. I am in 
earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not retreat 
a single inch — and I will be heard." 



38 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

The Liberator became, then, the organ of the 
cause, and its editor the chief apostle. Garrison 
was a trenchant writer and a vigorous fighter. His 
demand, throughout his entire career, was for 
immediate and absolute emancipation, ignoring all 
practical difficulties, depicting and exaggerating the 
horrors of slavery, and seeking to create a universal 
will in the free states for a national casting off of 
slavery as a national sin. He recognized no dis- 
tinction in the owners of slaves, lashing all alike in 
virulent language. He asserted that the need of 
the hour was to convert the North, to arouse it and 
create a powerful sentiment so strong that force, 
presumably political, would be used to compel the 
South to free its slaves. 

The immediate response to Garrison's appeal 
gave evidence of the existence of an intense feeling, 
hitherto unsuspected, in the North. Anti-slavery 
societies sprang rapidly into existence. By 1832 
there were so many societies in New England that 
a federation was established. In 1833 the "Ameri- 
can Society" was organized in Philadelphia and the 
spread of local societies throughout the North was 
extremely rapid. In 1835 there were two hundred 
of them, in 1836 five hundred, and by 1840 two 
thousand, nearly all well financed and prosperous, 
with a total membership of 175,000. Radical and 
denunciatory, the movement at first repelled rather 
than attracted men of power and reputation. Later 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 39 

the appeal overshadowed the manner and method, 
and such men as Whittier and Wendell Phillips 
came to its aid. Whittier's service as speaker and 
writer was valuable, but his most effective weapon 
was found in his poems. Wendell Phillips as an 
orator gifted in invective, never checked by facts, 
wholly intolerant, made use of the public platform, 
as Garrison used the press. Later came Theodore 
Parker in the pulpit, James Russell Lowell in prose 
and poetry. Palfrey in history. In the West there 
was immediate evidence of the moral appeal of 
anti-slavery to the youth of the nation. At Lane 
Theological Seminary, in Cincinnati, under the 
presidency of Lyman Beecher, a student debate on 
the question of slavery resulted in an expression 
of abolition sentiment. The Seminary drew from 
both banks of the Ohio, and the trustees, fearing to 
lose Southern students, prohibited public discussions 
of slavery. Nearly four fifths of the students 
withdrew to Oberlin College. Thus was created 
the Oberlin anti-slavery movement, furnishing a 
center for the agitation in the West. In the North 
as a whole there were three general groups. New 
England gave to the cause writers and orators, 
working on purely theoretical lines. The Middle 
States financed the movement, which drew support 
from the resources of wealthy philanthropists. 
The West attempted more practical operations, 
offering education to free negroes, and beginning 



40 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

that systematized aid to escaping slaves which later 
was known as the Underground Railroad. In all 
sections the membership of the societies was largely 
composed of young men. 

By 1835 anti-slavery had become a well-organized, 
definite propaganda, and from being derided had 
come to be feared and hated. The conservative 
and peace-seeking elements in the North, at first 
indifferent, were roused to forcible opposition. 
Garrison himself made the opening, for, driven by 
opposition to defend his crusade in all its aspects, 
and disappointed that he failed to arouse co- 
operation in the churches, he charged his impotence 
upon the church and the patriotic sense of the 
people. Such attitude could only be abhorrent to 
the great masses, and particularly so to two great 
ideal forces in America, — religion and patriotism. 
Smarting under church opposition, he renounced 
attendance in the Baptist church, proclaimed his 
disbelief in the inspiration of the Bible, denied the 
authority of tradition and inspiration, and ended 
by founding all his convictions on the philosophical 
basis of "natural right" and ^'reason." Inevitably 
the cry of infidelity was raised against anti-slavery. 
In addition he unhesitatingly advocated Northern 
secession as the only measure left when the cause 
was politically ignored. To the horror of sincere 
patriots he called the constitution "a covenant with 
death and an agreement with hell." Though this 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 41 

was but a temporary attitude, it alarmed his adhe- 
rents and gave to conservatism its opportunity. 
For a moment even Whittier doubted, but in the 
end he declared for the utmost free expression of 
abolition doctrines, writing 

" If we have whispered truth, whisper no longer, 
Speak as the trumpet does, — sterner and stronger." 

The attack on Garrisonian abolition came from 
every element of society. Evidence of church 
opposition is found in the New England Pastoral 
letter of 1837 to the Congregational churches, con- 
demning discussion of abolition in the pulpit, as 
certain to disrupt the church. A noted preacher. 
Prof. Moses Stuart of Andover Theological Semi- 
nary, found justification for slavery in the New 
Testament. In 1836 the Methodist Conference of 
New York State censured two of its members for 
favoring abolition. Such clerical intolerance but 
aroused the anti-slavery leaders to greater vigor. 
In a poem entitled "Clerical Oppressors," Whittier 
wrote : 

" Just God ! and these are they 
Who minister at thine altar, God of Right ! 
Men who their hands with prayer and blessing lay 
On Israel's Ark of light !" 



" Feed fat, ye locusts, feed ! 
And, in your tasseled pulpits, thank the Lord 



42 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

That, from the toiling bondsman's utter need, 
Ye pile your own full board. 

" How long, O Lord ! how long 
Shall such a priesthood barter truth away, 
And in Thy name, for robbery and wrong 
At Thy own altars pray?" 

In institutions of learning also the controversy 
raged, always with the few on the side of anti- 
slavery, and the many against it. Prof. Charles 
Pollen was dropped from the Harvard faculty as 
too open in his advocacy of the cause. In New 
Haven a plan to establish a manual training school 
for negroes was opposed by the town authorities, 
for fear it would endanger the popularity of Yale 
College. In 1832 Miss Crandall admitted a negress 
to her girls' school at Canterbury, Connecticut, 
whereupon the white scholars left. Miss Crandall 
then advertised a colored school. The town 
objected and arrested her pupils as vagrants. They 
were bailed out and returned to school. The legis- 
lature passed an act prohibiting the school. Miss 
Crandall defied the law, was arrested, and later 
freed by the Supreme Court of the state. Then 
there followed a combined boycott by the shop- 
keepers, physicians, and ministers of the surround- 
ing community, and the school was forced to close. 
At Phillips Andover Academy a situation developed 
of unusual interest, though, so far as I am aware, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 43 

it has attracted little attention from the historians 
of anti-slavery. My knowledge of it comes from 
the unpublished diaries and letters of one who took 
part in it. Garrison, thinking to make use of Eng- 
lish enthusiasm for the cause, had invited to 
America a noted speaker, George Thompson. Let 
an old man of eighty-six tell in his own language 
the effect of Thompson's lectures upon a boy of 
sixteen in Phillips Academy. 

"In the summer of 1835 Thompson came to 
Andover and gave eleven lectures in a small Metho- 
dist church, the only church that could be obtained 
for him, yet it was large enough for those who 
would go to hear such doctrine. There was with him 
one of our ministers by the name of Phelps, who 
afterwards wrote a book called 'Phelps on Slavery.' 
They had with them a young darkey who had run 
away from his master and whom, after they had 
had their say, they trotted out to tell a little about 
his slave life and how he had escaped from it, 
which he did with a glib tongue and forceful effect. 
I, with many of the students not only of the Acad- 
emy but a number of those in the Theological 
Seminary, attended the lectures. For the proposi- 
tion to form an anti-slavery society I had a ready 
assent, not simply because of the influence of the 
lectures but because from earlier influences I was 
already an abolitionist. So it was that by a previous 
training set on fire by the eloquence of Thompson 
in his Andover lectures, for he was an eloquent 
man, I was ready to join an anti-slavery society. 



44 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

I was one of fifty or sixty others that were ready 
for the same. The teachers and trustees felt that 
the formation of such a society would be a dis- 
grace and an injury to the popularity of the school 
and of course were opposed to it. Still claiming, 
in spite of their opposition, what seemed to us a 
right and duty for us to do, we were counted as 
rebels and begun to be treated as such. The first 
step was to deprive us of the privilege of recitation. 
One of our number drew up a statement of what 
we conceived to be our principles, rights, etc., to 
be presented to the public. We went out into the 
woods (or the timber as Westerners have it) to 
hear the address and consider. We endorsed the 
statement and solemnly pledged to stand together 
in contending for our rights and principles. Soon 
at morning prayers came this announcement to us 
all : 'Those of age must return to their studies within 
three days as loyal students or be expelled from the 
institution. All minors are to return at once. You 
in a sense are by your parents committed to our 
charge and we enjoin upon you what in our judg- 
ment they would have you do.' This in effect. 
Before leaving the room I went directly to the 
principal (Mr. Osgood) remonstrating. T can't,' 
he said, T can't do otherwise. I am bound as in 
chains.' 'But,' I said, T do not know what my 
parents would have me do, nor do you. May I 
have leave to go and see?' 'Yes,' said he, 'go home 
for three days. You will cool off and be prepared 
to come back.' I went home. W^hen evening came, 
I told my father the whole story, at the close saying, 
'Now, father, I will go back or not, just as you say.' 
He said nothing, except, 'Well, you may go to bed 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 45 

now.' The next morning he said nothing till about 
ten o'clock when the sun had dried up the dew ; he 
simply said, 'Well, my son, you may take the fork 
and open the haycocks today.' That was all he 
said, or ever said, about it. I went to work and 
worked with a will, glad that I was free from 
Phillips Academy, and that I had brought all my 
books with me, for I knew well enough what Father 
meant." 

Of the boys who took part in this "Andover 
Rebellion," and who later attended college, the 
majority went to Dartmouth, having been dis- 
couraged from making application to other colleges 
of New England. The incident is a striking illus- 
tration of the appeal to youth made by the ideals 
of anti-slavery, and in this case is all the more 
remarkable in that the students of the Theological 
Seminary did not approve the cause, and even tried 
to break up Thompson's meetings. The bringing of 
Thompson to America was indeed a blunder. The 
American people were peculiarly sensitive to 
"English interference," and their resentment was 
food for Garrison's opponents. There followed 
the Boston riot of October 21, 1835, from which 
Thompson fled, and in which Garrison was led 
through the streets with a halter about his neck. 
The handbill, which was distributed in the city and 
which led to the riot, reveals both the intensity of 
feeling, and its causes. 



46 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

THOMPSON 

The Abolitionist. 

That infamous foreign scoundrel Thompson 
will hold forth this afternoon, at the Liberator 
Office, No. 48 Washington Street. The present is 
a fair opportunity for the friends of the Union, to 
smoke Thompson out! It will be a contest between 
the Abolitionists and the friends of the Union. A 
purse of $100 has been raised by a number of 
patriotic citizens to reward the individual who shall 
first lay violent hands on Thompson, so that he may 
be brought to the tar kettle before dark. Friends 
of the Union be vigilant ! 

Boston, Wednesday, 12 o'clock. 

The year 1836 marks the end of this first 
"stormy" period of the anti-slavery crusade. 
Thereafter Garrison and his friends abandoned 
violent measures and methods. Abuse gave place 
to moderation and the following was increased. 
Yet the accession of men of note was slow. 
Emerson, a real friend of anti-slavery, cringed 
before the intemperate language of some of its 
leaders. ''Let us," he wrote, "withhold every 
reproachful, and, if we can, every indignant 
remark. In this cause, we must renounce our 
temper, and the risings of pride." He would, he 
said, "convince" the slave owner that it was 
"cheaper to pay wages than to own slaves." It 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 47 

is customarily stated that the intelHgent conser- 
vative opposition to Garrison in New England 
rested on respect for property, respect for the 
constitution as a bargain made, and fear of black 
atrocities such as had taken place in San Domingo. 
This classification omits the leading commercial 
interest vested in the cotton mills, and voiced in 
State Street. The whole conservative tradition of 
wealth, intelligence, blood, and political control 
was against anti-slavery. Its leaders were negli- 
gible, but the ideal was greater than the leaders, 
and in the next two decades many a natural con- 
servative was drawn, almost in spite of himself, 
into the cause of anti-slavery. And there was yet 
another element of strength in the movement. At 
first opposed by patriotic sentiment that feared its 
influence in severing the nation, it later found sup- 
port in the North from the very ideal of nation- 
ality, — an ideal that clung not merely to union, 
but to a union devoted to moral principles. Had 
political conceptions remained fixed as before 1815, 
there would have been no Northern outcry against 
slavery in the old states of the South, and little 
against its expansion to the West. The mere 
growth of anti-slavery in its later aspect is an 
evidence of the spread of the sentiment of 
nationality. 

It is in the South, however, that we may trace 
the more positive effects of the anti-slavery ideal. 



48 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

The earlier attitude of the South had been friendly 
to theories of emancipation, but puzzled in regard 
to the practical application of those theories. But 
the South resented Northern criticism. Benton, 
as late as 1830, reflected the older opinion, stating 
"slavery, in the abstract has but few advocates, or 
defenders, in the slave holdings states, and ... it 
would have fewer advocates among us than it has, 
if those who have nothing to do with the subject, 
would only let us alone." Under the irritation of 
the anti-slavery oratory, observing the growth of 
the anti-slavery societies. Southern leaders were 
driven to a defense of the morality of slavery. 
Governor McDuffie of South Carolina, in the middle 
thirties, was the first official champion of this new 
attitude. In a message to the legislature, he 
asserted that democracy meant a democracy of the 
intelligent merely, and that this was possible only 
where a servile labor class offered to the intelligent, 
opportunity and freedom to exercise their duties 
as citizens. Slavery, he claimed, was the essential 
bulwark of democracy; and the Bible was cited to 
prove the sanctity of the institution as directly 
ordered in the scheme of divine providence. 
McDuffie was in advance of most of the South, 
and his message was severely criticised, but by 
1850 the South was practically a unit in supporting 
these ideas, everywhere spread by press and pulpit. 
Opposition and attack naturally unify the elements 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 49 

in defense. Anti-slavery agitation created pro- 
slavery harmony in ideals, — forced the adoption of 
those ideals for which Southerners were ready to 
sacrifice their all. Southern resentment of the jeers 
of this band of idealists culminated in an effort to 
prohibit the discussion of slavery in the halls of 
Congress. There followed the famous battle of 
John Quincy Adams, for the right of petition. The 
contest lasted for years. In 1838, in a debate on 
the proposed annexation of Texas, Adams intro- 
duced a petition against annexation, on the ground 
of slavery, and then attempted to debate the ques- 
tion from this point of view. Instantly he was 
called to order by the speaker, Polk, who stated 
that slavery was not under discussion, — as if any 
condition in a state whose annexation was under 
discussion were not debatable. The House sup- 
ported Polk's ruling, evidence of the illogical 
lengths to which the South and its Northern allies 
would go to prevent expression of anti-slavery 
sentiment. Yet in this same debate, Campbell of 
South Carolina was permitted to defend slavery, 
stating that while there had been of old in the 
South a fear that it might be, perhaps, morally 
wrong. Northern criticism had led the South to a 
careful investigation which "has satisfied all sound 
minds that slavery is neither a moral nor a political 
evil ... it has relieved many minds from very 
painful and uneasy feelings." John Quincy Adams 



50 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

was no abolitionist, but he was an eager fighter, and 
when, in these contests, he heard the North con- 
stantly threatened with a Southern secession, he 
answered, "Let it come; if it must come in blood, 
yet I say let it come." 

I have no intention of dilating upon the argu- 
ments for and against slavery, — rather my purpose 
is to show by incident and quotation the intensity 
of feeling, the real conviction, aroused by the anti- 
slavery ideal, — to prove its constant influence on 
our history from 1830 through the Civil War, and 
even after. It welded the South into a unit, firm 
in defense of the institution in the old states, seek- 
ing expansion and power in new states, and ulti- 
mately turning to the theory of state liberty as the 
only salvation. In the North the movement gained 
power as the South became more arrogant in 
defiance. The Southerners' favorite comparison 
of the lot of the slaves with that of the poor of 
Great Britain, was met by Channing's retort, 
"Misery is not slavery." In the forties, the pro- 
posed annexation of Texas drove hundreds of the 
more intelligent of New England into the ranks of 
the abolitionists. The older leaders, formerly 
despised, became popular. Phillips could even jeer 
at the constitution, telling the conservative "Union" 
men to "say the constitution backwards instead 
of your prayers, and there will be no rebellion." 
Garrison was more happy and more convincing, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 51 

when, on July 4, he spoke on "The Lessons of 
Independence Day," and said: 

"I present myself as the advocate of my enslaved 
countrymen, at a time when their claim cannot be 
shuffled out of sight, and on an occasion which 
entitles me to a respectful hearing in their behalf. 
If I am asked to prove their title to liberty, my 
answer is, that the fourth of July is not a day to 
be wasted in establishing 'self-evident truths.' " 

The Mexican War was heart-breaking to the 
anti-slavery leaders, who saw its inception in a 
determination to expand slave territory and fix the 
institution for all time on the American nation. 
Momentarily, weariness and dismay caused a desire 
to separate from the South. Whittier wrote : 

" Take your land of sun and bloom ; 
Only leave to Freedom room 
For her plough, and forge, and loom;" 

but soon with restored courage and a renewed faith 
in the future of this nation, the contest assumed 
wider proportions, and this largely because of the 
new men who now joined it. Such men as Burlin- 
game, Wilson, Sumner, Dana, Palfrey, Charles 
Francis Adams, Mann, Chase, and Hale, all of 
whom earlier were at least indifferent, came to 
swell the list of influential workers. Lowell was 
a tower of strength, especially in his "Biglow 



52 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

Papers." He stated the "Pious Editor's Creed" in 
these words: 

" I du believe in Freedom's cause, 

Ez fur away ez Payris is; 
I love to see her stick her claws 

In them infarnal Phayrisees; 
It's wal enough agin a king 

To dror resolves an' triggers, — 
But libbaty's a kind o' thing 

Thet don't agree with niggers." 

Labored economic contentions to prove the ineffi- 
ciency of slave as compared with free labor, were 
not wanting either. But the Southern answer to 
this was easy, — as that of Governor Hammond, 
who admitted the economic superiority of free 
labor, and continued: 

"But the question is whether free or slave labor 
is cheapest to us in this country, at this time, 
situated as we are. And it is to be decided at 
once by the fact that we cannot avail ourselves of 
any other than slave labor." 

and this conviction, unquestionably sincere, inten- 
sified Southern belief in the rightfulness of slavery. 
After the annexations of the Mexican War, — 
when California was admitted as a free state, when 
the Compromise of 1850 had apparently settled for 
all the territory of the Union the conditions and 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 53 

extent of slavery, there was a distinct reaction in 
the intensity of this conflict of ideals, and on both 
sides. Except among a few extremists, the domi- 
nant note was one of thankfulness for danger 
escaped, and determination, for the safety of the 
Union, to avoid disturbing comments. This was 
what was meant by the "finality" of the compromise. 
In both North and South the elder statesmen, in- 
tensely loyal to the Union, seeing it threatened by 
slavery agitation, urged "finality" and sought to 
quiet all discussion, — dilating upon the trade rela- 
tions of the two sections. A few of the younger, 
or newer, men were not content. Jefferson Davis 
led the extreme faction of the South, while 
Seward became the champion of Northern idealists, 
asserting "Whoever declares that trade is the 
cement of this Union, libels the idea of American 
civilization." The trend of public sentiment seemed, 
however, to be toward conciliation, until Douglas of 
Illinois, with no conception of the deep underlying 
feeling of the North, aroused Northern wrath by 
his bill for the Kansas-Nebraska territory. That 
bill provided for the territory of Kansas, with or 
without slavery, as the people of the territory 
might elect. "We are betrayed," shouted the anti- 
slavery leaders, and the people, sincerely believing 
in the finality of the legislation of 1850, considering 
themselves tricked, responded to the cry with a 
frenzy that astounded Douglas, and stirred an 



54 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

answering challenge from the South. The bill was 
passed in May, 1854, and slaveholders from Mis- 
souri at once crossed into the new territory. A cry 
went up in the North for an emigration of free 
labor, to "save Kansas," and already there was 
organized in New England the Emigrant Aid Soci- 
ety, whose first party started for Kansas in July, 
1854, led by strong men and vigorous fighters. To 
them Whittier addressed a poem striking the note 
of a new Puritan emigration : 

" We cross the prairie as of old 
The pilgrims crossed the sea, 
To make the West, as they the East, 
The homestead of the free !" 

The issue was joined at last between the ideals 
of slavery and anti-slavery, and the conflict of 
force, not argument merely, was begun in blood, 
upon the soil of Kansas. It would be an error to 
regard this outcry in the North as an expression 
of anti-slavery sentiment merely. National patriot- 
ism created intense irritation at the breaking of a 
solemn agreement, and this was the dominant feel- 
ing. Yet it was the ideal of anti-slavery, neverthe- 
less, whether openly acknowledged or not, that 
permitted and caused this popular expression. 

In the next few years, the old Whig party, its 
ideals forgotten, was discredited, the new Repub- 
lican party, vigorously acclaiming ideals, was born, 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 55 

and in this political disruption the Democratic 
party, largely controlled by Southern politicians, 
won the election of 1856. Then followed a rapid 
readjustment of party lines, and in 1860, the 
Republicans inheriting the force of the Free Soilers, 
and strengthened by defections from Whigs and 
Democrats, elected Lincoln, in spite of Southern 
threats of secession. The strength of this new 
party lay in the courage of its convictions and 
ideals, and its chief cry was "no slavery in the 
territories." Whatever may be said, however 
largely other elements may be magnified, however 
clearly evidence may show other motives deter- 
mining Lincoln's vote, whatever quotation may be 
made from the press, the platform, and Lincoln's 
own words to prove that the election did not mean 
a desire for abolition in the old states, — yet the 
historical fact remains that it was the ideal of 
anti-slavery which had brought this upheaval in 
national politics. 

In my previous lecture, I stated that the ideal of 
nationality in the Civil War rose above all other 
ideals, and fought and won that war. But this 
involves no denial of the power of the ideal of 
anti-slavery, nor of its victory in the election of 
1860. The instinct and understanding of the South 
were correct. Whatever the immediate results, 
slavery must ultimately disappear within this 
Union, and the South, seeking to preserve its ideal 



56 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

of slavery, sought safety in the constitutional doc- 
trines of state liberty, and the right of secession. 
And the South was wholly sincere, basing its 
defense of an institution it believed beneficent upon 
that same Declaration of Independence to which 
the anti-slavery leaders appealed. Jefferson Davis, 
in his farewell speech to the Senate, January 21, 
1861, said, "The sacred Declaration of Independ- 
ence has been invoked to maintain the position of 
the equality of the races." This interpretation of 
the word "equality" he repudiated, and in defense 
of the secession of his state, Mississippi, he 
asserted that she but acted under the sense of one 
of the very grievances that had caused the Revo- 
lution of 1776. In proof of this he cited, among 
the grievances against King George the Third, one 
in which he was accused of "endeavoring of late 
to stir insurrection among our slaves." Davis was 
in error in thinking there was such an item in the 
Declaration, for that to which he referred reads, 
"He has excited domestic insurrections amongst 
us," and in Jefferson's original draft this was "He 
has incited treasonable insurrections of our fellow 
citizens, with the allurements of forfeiture and 
confiscation of our property," — clearly no refer- 
ence to slaves, while in the very next section of 
Jefferson's draft, though omitted in the final form 
of the Declaration, is a vigorous attack upon King 
George III for maintaining the African slave trade 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 57 

against the protests of the colonies. Certainly 
Davis was no historical student, but the very bold- 
ness of his error reveals his sincerity, and the inten- 
sity of Southern conviction. He hoped for a 
peaceful secession, but if the North refused this, 
he affirmed of the South that "putting our trust in 
God, and in our own firm hearts and strong arms, 
we will vindicate the right as best we may." 

"It is joyous in the midst of perilous times to 
look around upon a people united in heart, where 
one purpose of high resolve animates and actuates 
the whole, when the sacrifices to be made are not 
weighed in the balance, against honor, right, liberty, 
and equality. Obstacles may retard, but they can 
not long prevent, the progress of a movement sanc- 
tioned by its justice and sustained by a virtuous 
people. Reverently let us invoke the God of our 
fathers to guide and protect us in our efforts to 
perpetuate the principles which by His blessing they 
were able to vindicate, establish, and transmit to 
their posterity; and with a continuance of His 
favor, ever gratefully acknowledged, we may 
hopefully look forward to success, to peace, to 
prosperity." 

In these inspiring words, Jefferson Davis concluded 
his inaugural address of February 18, 1861. He 
voiced the ideal of liberty. Alexander Stephens, 
as vice-president, upheld the ideal of slavery. 
Acknowledging that the fathers of the constitution 



58 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

might have had in mind the ultimate extinction 
of slavery, he said: 

"Our new government is founded upon exactly 
the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its 
corner-stone rests upon the great truth that the 
negro is not equal to the white man, that slavery — 
subordination to the superior race, — is his natural 
and normal condition. 

"This, our new government, is the first in the 
history of the world based upon this great physical, 
philosophical, and moral truth. . . . Our Confed- 
eracy is founded upon principles in strict con- 
formity with these views. This stone, which was 
rejected by the first builders, 'is become the chief 
of the corner,' the real 'corner-stone' in our new 
edifice." 

Here was the expression of an ideal, largely 
created by the anti-slavery movement in the North. 
Who will say that the ideal of anti-slavery was not 
a powerful force in our history? Yet at this same 
moment the abolition leaders had hushed their 
voices. At first jubilant over the coming disrup- 
tion of the Union, Wendell Phillips had said that 
the flag of the United States might now be placed 
as a curio in the museum of the Historical Society. 
But three months later, April 21, 1861, a convert 
to the higher ideal of nationality, in the same public 
hall, he renounced his stand, declaring "today the 
abolitionist is merged in the citizen." Later he 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 59 

acknowledged the ideal nature of the conflict on 
both sides. 

"The War for the Union," he said, "was . . . 
inevitable; in one sense, nobody's fault; the inevi- 
table result of past training, the conflict of ideas, 
millions of people grappling each other's throats, 
every soldier in each camp certain that he is fight- 
ing for an idea which holds the salvation of the 
world. . . ." 

There is no need to dwell upon the later phases 
of the conflict between these opposing ideals. The 
Emancipation Proclamation was a war measure, 
but it became effective only as territory was con- 
quered by the North. During the progress of the 
war, the North, self-righteous, became sentimental 
over the negro, and at its conclusion legislated for 
him on lines of sentiment, rather than of science. 
But error in the application of an ideal does not 
refute its actual historical force. Let us turn again 
to the statement that geography and industrialism 
created and determined this struggle. 

The economic historian has said that, from 1840 
to 1860, class interests ruled more than ever before 
in our history, and that "moral consciousness" was 
at its lowest ebb. For this astounding assertion, he 
should have piled proof on proof, for it is directly 
contrary to accepted history. Possibly he mistook 
the shattering of traditions, the unrest of the time, 



60 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

for decay, when it was, in fact, the first evidence of 
new life. As I read this period, it was one of intense, 
even fierce, spiritual expression, manifesting itself 
in the ideals of nationality, manifest destiny, democ- 
racy, anti-slavery, and in a wonderful home mis- 
sionary movement. Economic interests can not, do 
not, explain the growth of anti-slavery sentiment 
after 1840. The deeper economic interest, the con- 
test of free against slave labor, may, indeed, as 
Karl Marx perceived, have been an element in the 
struggle, but it was an element almost wholly with- 
out influence on men's minds, for it was unrecog- 
nized by the mass. The more immediate economic 
interest of the North, whether of the cotton lords 
of New England, or of the business world in gen- 
eral, was against the agitation of the slavery 
question, and it is the obvious economic interest, 
not the basic one, that makes itself felt in political 
action. 

The real truth is that, until the thirties, New 
England religious dogmatism, and the controversies 
in regard to it, held intellectual interests, to the 
exclusion of humanitarian sentiment in regard to 
slavery. Meanwhile the economic interest of New 
England, centered in her manufactories, tended to 
a defense of slavery. Abolition and anti-slavery 
were nowhere more bitterly denounced. It is true, 
no doubt, that Southern industrial conditions, agi- 
tated by the anti-slavery outcry, deepened Southern 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 61 

conviction of the morality of slavery, but it is not 
true that the absence of those conditions in New- 
England created an anti-slavery ideal. That ideal 
was, rather, an intellectual and spiritual concep- 
tion, — the result of a thousand years, it may be, 
of the slow development of human thought, and 
of a thought always laboring under the necessity of 
differentiating good from evil. The ideals of per- 
sonal liberty, and of humanity, were not created 
by the "boulder-strewn soil" of New England. 
They already existed there, and when directed to 
the question of slavery, won a victory in men's 
minds over the economic interest of the community. 



Ill 

MANIFEST DESTINY— AN EMOTION 



Ill 

MANIFEST DESTINY— AN EMOTION 

Before attempting a narration of the origin and 
growth of the ideal of manifest destiny, in its terri- 
torial expansion aspect, I find it necessary, in order 
that its later phases may be understood, to state 
explicitly what I conceive to be the essence of the 
ideal of manifest destiny as a force in our history, 
actively recognized at the time it was exercised. 
The materialistic historians attribute the westward 
movement of population to a mere desire for the 
"gross comforts of material abundance." In 
answer to this. President Woodrow Wilson, the 
historian, has written: 

"The obvious fact is that for the creation of the 
nation the conquest of her proper territory from 
Nature was first necessary; and this task, which 
is hardly yet completed, has been idealized in the 
popular mind. A bold race has derived inspiration 
from the size, the difficulty, the danger of the task." 

In my opinion both of these interpretations are in 
error. The purely materialistic historian loses sight 
of the fact that the people who took part in the 
westward movement up to 1830, carried with them 
the ideal of democracy. Mr. Wilson, regarding this 
wonderful movement from the point of view of 



Q6 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

later times, himself feeling the joy the pioneer must 
have had in the mere subjection of the soil, admir- 
ing his energy and courage, has depicted the move- 
ment in colors that serve to idealize it. But it is 
an error to assert that our understanding, our ideali- 
zation, of events and conditions was also the con- 
scious understanding and idealization of the men 
who were participants in those events and condi- 
tions. We of the present age rightly regard as 
heroic the American migration from East to West, 
and exalt the personal virtues of the men who 
led, — and of the women, those "Mothers of a 
Forest Land, whose bosoms pillowed Men!" But 
an ideal, unless it is consciously held by the actors, 
can not be considered as a living force on men's 
minds in their political activities. Now I very 
much doubt whether a man who "moved west," 
ever felt any "inspiration from the size, the diffi- 
culty, the danger of the task," and I certainly do 
not believe that before 1830, in thus moving west, 
he was at all consciously influenced by an ideal of 
expanding national territory. The inspiration 
which he did carry west with him was that of 
democracy, and when by 1830 there had been 
added the inspiration of nationality, the two oper- 
ated to create a new element in manifest destiny, 
and that new element was territorial expansion, — 
a continent-wide national destiny. The westward 
movement did not create this new ideal, it was but 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 67 

the necessary preliminary condition in which certain 
inspirations, already held, took on a new form. 
It follows from this that I do not consider the 
mere shifting of population a result of the ideal 
of manifest destiny. That ideal included, up to 
about 1830, the sense of democracy and a belief in 
its superiority; afterwards, a desire to expand it, 
and to increase national power by territorial 
acquisition. The ideal of democracy and its mani- 
festations, I reserve for a later lecture. The present 
lecture is primarily concerned, then, with the emo- 
tion of territorial expansion, — the emotion of 
manifest destiny. But it is to be understood that 
in each step forward in our territorial growth since 
1800, there was a general belief that democracy was 
expanding as well as national boundaries. 



The sense of destiny is an attribute of all nations 
and all peoples. If we could penetrate beyond the 
veil of recorded history, and grasp the emotions of 
tribes and races, of whom it is known only that 
they existed, probably we should find that these 
tribes also felt themselves a people set apart for 
some high purpose. Possibly even the cannibal, 
as he sacrifices his victim, satisfies both his physical 
and his spiritual being, — though it is unlikely that 
the victim appreciates the service he is rendering. 
Among civilized peoples, national destiny has fre- 



68 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

quently been accompanied by cannibalistic rites, — 
also with an equal ignorance of a service performed 
by the absorbed. Certainly there is no great nation 
today that has not a belief in its destiny, both in 
respect to territory and of peculiar function. The 
larger nations seek "a place in the sun" for their 
peoples. The smaller are content to feel that their 
existence, as now established, is a manifestation of 
providence, and urge this against absorption 
threatened by powerful neighbors. But all nations 
that are worth anything, always have had, and 
always will have, some ideal of national destiny, 
and without it, would soon disappear, and would 
deserve their fate. 
T) America has felt herself destined for various 

high purposes. In early colonial times, the New 
England communities felt more than all else that 
they were destined to occupy and preserve a small 
section of the earth, where those of like religious 
faith and practice could realize, without govern- 
mental interference, certain religious ideals. There 
were few who thought of a separate national exist- 
ence from England, and it was not until shortly 
before the war of independence that there was any 
general conception of governmental ideals different 
from those of Great Britain. Even after inde- 
pendence was won, the eyes of America were still 
unconsciously turned toward the old world, the 
colonial instinct was still dominant, and it was only 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 69 

after the war of 1812 that America turned her gaze 
inward upon herself. At once she felt and ex- 
pressed her "peculiar destiny," — at first as the 
chosen servant of the spreading ideal of democ- 
racy, later in terms of territorial greatness. Mili- 
tant patriotism came to reinforce this sense of a 
special national function in the cause of civilization, 
and that patriotism pictured Great Britain as the 
hereditary foe of America. This was inevitable, 
since stories of valor or of suffering were neces- 
sarily connected with the only nation with whom 
we had fought. The schoolboy, in selected orations 
and poetry, was trained in this hostility towards 
England, — a hostility which was, in fact, merely 
one expression of nationality. Captain Hall, an 
Englishman traveling in the United States, in 1827, 
was both amused and astonished on visiting the 
Boston public schools, that a boy called up to 
"speak" for the visitor's pleasure, should recite a 
"furious philippic" against Great Britain, while a 
second youth gave an oration beginning: 

/ "For eighteen hundred years the world had 

/slumbered in ignorance of liberty, and of the true 

/ rights of freemen. At length America arose in all 

/ her glory, to give the world the long desired lesson !" 

^-The intolerance of America in thus training its 
youth in fixed hostility to old England, the arro- 
gance of the young nation, in a new land, assuming 



V 



70 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

to instruct the old world, were truly amusing, yet 
back of all bombast and back of all crudity of 
expression was the sincere conviction that America 
was destined to be the greater nation, that it would 
accomplish greater things, that it could offer excep- 
tional enlightenment and bestow unusual favors. 

The period from 1830 to 1860 is usually regarded 
as that in which the ideal of manifest destiny most 
affected our history. During these years the term 
"manifest destiny" vaguely expressed the sense of 
the American people that their government gave 
an example to the world of the success of the 
democratic principle, and that power went hand 
in hand with democracy. Previous to 1830 the 
westward shifting of population did not imply a 
belief in a continent-wide country. Year after 
year American citizens laboriously surmounted the 
Appalachian range, sought the sources of the 
streams flowing to the west, and followed these 
to the land of promise. Until the completion of 
the Erie Canal the bulk of this movement was from 
the middle and southern states, a poor white popu- 
lation finding in the rich soil of Kentucky, or 
Indiana, or Ohio, an improved industrial oppor- 
tunity, and founding settlements marked by extreme 
simplicity and equality. Gradually the wide domain 
of the territory east of the Mississippi was dotted 
with villages and farms, and by 1830 the frontier 
had moved across the river into the lands of the 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 71 

Louisiana purchase. After 1825, there came an 
increased northern migration, swelled by a steady 
stream of British immigrants, though this last was 
never large and almost ceased temporarily in 1830. 
The German immigration of the early thirties added 
to this wave of humanity moving westward. But 
as yet there was room for all, and save for the 
uneasy frontiersman, restless if he had any neigh- 
bors, there could be no pressing need, for many 
years to come, of lands beyond the established 
boundaries of the country. 

The controversy with Great Britain in the 
twenties over Oregon made clear that America, 
before 1830, had no thought of continental dominion 
and regarded as a dreamer the man who would still 
expand the national domain. Benton, senator from 
Missouri, was such a dreamer, but dared not give 
expression to his dream. In 1825, Russia, by 
treaties with England and the United States, had 
renounced her claims south of 54° 40', leaving the 
two remaining powers in joint possession. At once 
a bill was introduced in Congress for the military 
occupation of Oregon. A few supported it, more 
were opposed, but the great majority were wholly 
indifferent. Dickerson of New Jersey made the 
principal speech against the measure. "We have 
not," he said, "adopted a system of colonization, 
and it is to be hoped we never shall. Oregon can 
never be one of the United States. If we extend 



72 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

our laws to it, we must consider it as a colony. . . . 
Is this territory of Oregon ever to become a state, 
a member of this Union? Never. The Union is 
already too extensive." He then entered upon a 
calculation to prove the utter impossibility of a 
representative in Congress for Oregon, since mere 
distance would prove an effective barrier. Postu- 
lating that a representative must visit his constit- 
uents at least once a year, he stated the distance 
from the mouth of the Columbia to Washington 
as 4650 miles, or 9300 for the round trip. Accord- 
ing to federal law granting mileage payment to 
congressmen, the average rate of travel was then 
twenty miles per day, but supposing the Oregonian 
to exceed this rate of speed, and to maintain the 
high average of thirty miles, *'This," continued 
Dickerson, ''would allow the member a fortnight 
to rest himself at Washington before he should 
commence his journey home. ... It would be more 
expeditious, however, to come by water round Cape 
Horn, or to pass through Behrings Straits, round 
the North coast of this Continent to Baffin's Bay, 
thence through Davis Straits to the Atlantic, and 
so on to Washington. It is true, this passage is 
not yet discovered, except upon our maps, — but it 
will be as soon as Oregon shall be a State." 

Benton himself was oppressed by the remote- 
ness of the territory, and standing almost alone in 
the Senate, did not dare to profess a belief that 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 73 

Oregon could ever be admitted to the Union. He 
asserted, rather, that "the greatest of all advantages 
to be derived from the occupation of this country, 
is in the exclusion of foreign powers from it." 
He did assert, however, that Oregon would soon be 
settled, either by European or by American colo- 
nists, and declared that it lay with Congress to 
determine which. Seeking to persuade his hearers 
to action he pictured American settlement on lines 
of ultimate separation from the United States. The 
successive steps would be military occupation, set- 
tlements and a civil territorial government, then 
clamors against the hardship of dependence upon 
a government so remote as Washington, and finally 
independence willingly granted by the mother 
country. Continuing his plea for action, Benton 
even acknowledged that the Rocky Mountains 
formed the natural limit of the United States. To 
the west of that line, this offspring of our institu- 
tions would guard our interests, and America would 
have cause to rejoice in having aided "in the erec- 
tion of a new Republic, composed of her children, 
speaking her language, inheriting her principles, 
devoted to liberty and equality, and ready to stand 
by her side against the combined powers of the old 
world." 

The long journey to Oregon was indeed a barrier 
to settlement in the twenties. The next step of the 
American advance was to the southwest rather than 



74 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

to the northwest, and marks the faint beginnings 
of the expressed ideal of a territorial manifest des- 
tiny, later developed to great proportions. There 
were several elements merged in the American 
interest in, and desire for, Texas; the impulsion of 
the westward movement as lands further west and 
south became available to settlers; the natural and 
hopeful interest of Southerners who urged and 
anticipated annexation; and, in addition, the call 
of manifest destiny, — the yearning for power and 
territory. For a time, however, the more cautious 
and conservative opinion of the older states checked 
the cry for annexation and Texas was forced to rest 
under a separate sovereignty. Meanwhile, as evi- 
dence that the earlier movement on Texas was no 
mere slavery conspiracy, as Northern historians of 
the time declared, but was a manifestation of 
revived restlessness, and of a popular belief in the 
destined further expansion of America, we have 
but to note the conditions of the Canadian rebellion 
of 1837. 

The causes of this miniature revolution do not 
call for narration, except to explain that in both 
Lower and Upper Canada the leaders proclaimed 
their admiration of American institutions and 
claimed that they were fighting for self-government. 
Easily defeated in Canada, they fled across the 
border, appealing to the "sympathy and generosity 
of a liberty-loving people," and there renewed their 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 75 

efforts to overthrow the Canadian governments. 
The revolution began in the last months of 1837. 
At that time the United States was in the throes of 
the most serious financial crisis in her history; 
everywhere there were great numbers of idle men, 
and as filibusters and meddlesome fighters are 
always recruited from the idle and lawless classes, 
there were many sympathizers, with empty pockets, 
ready to join the adventure to "redeem Canada." 
Yet there were higher motives, and higher-minded 
men concerned in the movement. MacKenzie, the 
leader of the revolution in Upper Canada, was a 
man of unquestioned honor and high ideals, and 
won the sympathy of the American idealist who saw 
in his plans an effort to spread American political 
principles. In addition, there were those who 
thought that the revolution might be a first step 
toward the admission of Canada to the Union. The 
emotion of territorial greatness was beginning to be 
felt, and the riff-raff of the northern frontier, from 
Vermont to Michigan, were encouraged by the 
expression of ideals of democracy and expansion, 
in public meetings and in the press. The govern- 
ment at Washington condemned this border excite- 
ment, but at first was badly hampered in suppressing 
it, owing to antiquated and ineffective neutrality 
laws. 

"The American," says Mr. Bryce, "likes excite- 
ment for its own sake and goes wherever he can 



76 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

find it." Americans of this spirit were the first to 
hasten to the call of the Canadian revolutionists, 
but their number was soon increased by the unem- 
ployed, and even by some who saw in the event a 
chance to attack privilege and property, — as the 
barber of Plattsburg, moulding musket balls, and 
rejoicing that ''one ball would do the business of 
a man worth £2000 a year." The first rendezvous 
of these would-be American-Canadian "Patriots" 
was Navy Island, just above Niagara Falls on the 
Canadian side of the river. Here a camp of the 
"grand army of invasion" was established, and here 
a steamboat, the Caroline, carried supplies and men 
from the American side. In order to cut off this 
communication, a small Canadian force crossed the 
river in the night to the spot where the Caroline 
was anchored, cut her out, towed her into mid- 
stream, set her on fire, and left her to drift over 
the falls. The affair created a terrific excitement. 
American territory had been invaded, her sacred 
soil polluted by the myrmidons of a despotic gov- 
ernment. The Rochester Democrat, inspired to 
poetic frenzy, wrote: 

" As over the shelving rocks she broke, 
And plunged in her turbulent grave, 
The slumbering genius of Freedom v^oke, 

Baptized in Niagara's wave, 
And sounded her warning tocsin far, 
From Atlantic's shore to the polar star." 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 77 

For genius immersed in Niagara's wave, this was 
indeed a far cry. But the "CaroHne Affair" was in 
truth a serious one, since it called for revenge, thus 
adding strength to the "patriot" cause. 

On the Canadian side, the cry arose that Great 
Britain must gird herself to defend monarchical 
institutions and territory. Lieutenant-Governor 
Head, of Upper Canada, was as rabid and as melo- 
dramatic as the editor of the Democrat. He pic- 
tured this petty conflict as a contest between repub- 
lican and monarchical institutions. In a public 
address he asserted: 

"The People of Upper Canada detest Democ- 
racy. . . . They are perfectly aware that there 
exist in the Lower Province one or two individuals 
who inculcate the Idea that this Province is about 
to be disturbed by the Interference of Foreigners 
[Americans], whose Power and whose Numbers 
will prove invincible. 

"In the name of every Regiment of militia in 
Upper Canada I publicly promulgate— Let them 
come if they dare." 

"The enemy of the British Constitution," he 
said, "is its low-bred Antagonist, Democracy in 
America." 

Later, in reporting a skirmish between a few 
Canadians and revolutionists, part of whom were 
American recruits, he wrote: 



78 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

"The Republicans stood their ground until the 
monarchical troops arrived within about twenty- 
yards of them, when, abandoning their position, as 
also their Principle that all men are born equal, 
they decamped in the greatest confusion." 

As apparently there were no shots exchanged in this 
fearful battle, the case does indeed seem one of 
those rare instances where principles were the sole 
contenders. Surely, if the American was fond of 
"twisting the Lion's tail," Head had revenge in 
"plucking the Eagle's feathers." 

From a perspective of seventy-five years, the 
American relation to the Canadian rebellion seems 
ephemeral, — serio-comic. Yet the disturbances 
along the border gave evidence of a real intensity 
of feeling, and a genuine passion for expansion. 
The trouble lasted for two years, and was contem- 
porary with a renewed dispute over the Maine 
boundary. There now came to the surface the feel- 
ing, later very powerful, that American destiny ran 
counter to that of England on this continent, and 
that one or the other must give way. Gushing, 
speaking in Congress in 1839, asserted that England 
was pursuing a definite policy of irritation, wher- 
ever she could press in upon the United States, — 
over the Maine boundary, in the Northwest, where 
the Indians were causing trouble, and in Oregon. 

"Unless," he said, "this all grasping spirit of 
universal encroachment on the part of Great 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 79 

Britain be arrested, either by moderation in her 
councils, or by fear, the time must and will come, 
when her power and ours cannot co-exist on the 
continent of North America." 

This meant that the United States would be forced 
to expand in defense of what she already pos- 
sessed, — but back of this lay the desire of expansion 
for its own sake. In the late thirties this demand 
for territory and power was nation-wide, and 
though it was but one of the causes of the border 
troubles of that time, it first found expression in 
them. Failing to achieve results in Canada, interest 
easily turned to the southern border, where Texas 
waited. 

When, in 1836, Texas declared her independence 
from Mexico, the Americans who had established 
that independence, strongly desired annexation. 
The offer was declined, but the migration into this 
new country rapidly increased, and the newcomers 
reinforced annexation sentiment both in Texas and 
in the United States. By 1842, Texas had secured 
recognition from the stronger powers as an inde- 
pendent state, and to two of these powers, England 
and the United States, the future of Texas became 
a matter of great importance. Slavery existed, and 
cotton seemed destined to be the chief industrial 
product. England, hoping to free herself from 
dependence on American cotton, and at the same 
time establish a barrier to further American expan- 



80 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

sion, naturally encouraged Texan independence. 
The United States, while rejoicing over this new 
Anglo-Saxon nation, was yet in a doubtful position 
in regard to it. Mexico stubbornly refused to 
acknowledge Texan independence, and annexation 
might involve us in a war. Northern feeling was 
against a new slave state, so large that several slave 
states seemed then inevitable. In the South there 
rapidly developed enthusiasm for annexation on the 
score of Southern political influence, and the senti- 
ment of manifest destiny was appealed to, — an 
effective appeal, since the hearts of all our Western 
people beat responsive to the cry. By 1842, the 
South was determined to have Texas, and the 
"Texan game," as Northern opponents termed it, 
was begun. 

Manifest destiny was a strong factor in annexa- 
tion sentiment, but a more specific argument was 
found in the national jealousy of England. Tyler 
and Calhoun raised the cry of British opposition, 
with more justice than the partisans of anti- 
slavery admitted. Great Britain did indeed hope 
that in Texas she would find a block to the increas- 
ing power of America, and even dreamed of induc- 
ing Texas to abolish slavery. Elliot, the British 
diplomat in Texas, confined his official efforts, 
however, to a preservation of the independence of 
Texas. He sought to check annexation sentiment, 
picturing the future greatness of an independent 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 81 

Texas. British colonists were introduced, but they 
were few in number compared with the steady 
stream from the United States, and, as Elliot him- 
self sorrowfully confessed, they were wholly 
inferior in the art of pioneering. Like Peter 
Simple, the British colonist ''preferred to walk, 
rather than to run, toward his goal, for fear he 
would arrive out of breath." Elliot, marveling at 
the difficulties and crudities of the American push 
westward, said "they jolt and jar terrifically in their 
progress, but on they do get." With the coming of 
new American settlers, it became certain that Texas 
herself cared more for annexation than for inde- 
pendence. In the United States the sentiment of 
expansion grew steadily in strength, and though 
Calhoun, raising the cry of British interference, was 
at first defeated by the conservative and anti- 
slavery elements in the Senate, the campaign of 
Polk in 1844, when the rivalry with England for 
Oregon was also played upon, settled the destiny 
of Texas. In that campaign was heard, at last, 
no mere feeble and isolated assertion of a continent- 
wide destiny, but a positive and general profession 
of faith in the inevitable progress of democratic 
institutions and "Anglo-Saxon" ideals, destined to 
triumph over monarchical principles and inferior 
races. The clap-trap political oratory of this cam- 
paign is distressing to the patriotic historian, and 
I refrain from quotation, but it must be recognized 



82 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

that such oratory was used and was effective, 
simply because it reflected an American emotion. 
Manifest destiny, in terms of expansion, suddenly 
revealed itself as a powerful sentiment, against 
which the conservative minority struggled in vain. 
Nor was the expression of this sentiment confined 
to the political orator. Lyman Beecher, in a sermon 
enumerating the vices threatening American life, 
yet claimed for America a superior position among 
nations. "Our very beginning," he said, "was 
civilized, learned and pious." And even yet 
America is 

". . . still the richest inheritance which the mercy 
of God continues to the troubled earth. Nowhere 
beside, if you search the world over, will you find 
so much real liberty; so much equality; so much 
personal safety, and temporal prosperity ; so general 
an extension of useful knowledge ; so much reli- 
gious instruction; so much moral restraint; and 
so much divine mercy, to make these blessings the 
power of God, and the wisdom of God unto 
salvation." 

If these blessings were indeed peculiar to America, 
what reasonable opposition could exist to carrying 
them into new territory? 

Polk's election determined the future of Texas, 
and Great Britain regretfully relinquished her hope 
of a barrier state, yet consoled herself with the 
thought that mere territorial weight would break 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 83 

the Union in fragments. But with Oregon it was 
a different matter. During the campaign, Demo- 
cratic orators had declared for the extreme Ameri- 
can claim, — "fifty-four forty or fight," and to this 
England would by no means agree. Southern 
leaders, gratified as to Texas, now sought to quiet 
the expansion sentiment they had used with so 
much success. Previously, in 1843, a bill for the 
organization of Oregon, offering lands to settlers, 
had been introduced in Congress. Senator McDuffie 
of South Carolina, who saw in slavery the "bulwark 
of republican institutions," was against it, saying: 

"I would not give a pinch of snuff for the whole 
territory. I wish to God we did not own it, I wish 
it was an impassable barrier to secure us against 
the intrusion of others. . . . Do you think your 
honest farmers in Pennsylvania, New York, or even 
Ohio or Missouri, will abandon their farms to go 
upon any such enterprise as that? God forbid!" 

At the time McDuffie made this speech, other 
Southerners were more reserved, but no sooner had 
Tyler despatched the offer to receive Texas into 
the Union than the sentiments of McDuffie were 
revived. But Polk, a determined expansionist, 
already planning to go far beyond Texas, and to 
carry American territory to the Pacific in the South 
as well as in the North, stood firmly for Oregon. 
Apparently he intended to exact the extreme 
American claim, and hostilities with England 



84 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

seemed near. At the same time, Mexico, still 
claiming Texas as her own, threatened war, while 
Texas unexpectedly delayed a formal acceptance 
of the annexation proposal. The situation seemed 
dangerous, and with a prospect of war on both 
northern and southern borders, wisdom urged 
caution. Horace Greeley, opposed to slavery 
expansion, argued in the Neiu York Tribune against 
any expansion, citing Benton's speech of 1825 to 
prove that the Rocky Mountains formed a natural 
boundary. Winthrop, in Congress, answered the 
expansionist dogma, "The finger of God never 
points in a direction contrary to the extension of 
the glory of the Republic," by quoting: 

" Glory is like a circle in the water, 
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, 
Till by broad spreading it disperse to naught." 

But Greeley and Winthrop were upheld by the 
anti-slavery faction alone. The New York Sun 
and the New York Herald strongly approved 
annexation and expansion, the latter asserting, 
"Our march is onward for centuries to come, still 
onward — and they who do not keep up with us, 
must fall behind and be forgotten," — apparently a 
reference to Mexico. According to the Evening 
Post, Greeley stood alone in the North: "With the 
exception of the Tribune . . . there is not a press 
in the Union which does not say Oregon is ours 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 85 

and must be maintained." Polk had no intention 
of drifting into war with England, and, after a due 
amount of bluster, agreed to the forty-ninth parallel 
as the proper boundary of Oregon ; but before this 
was known, the Herald, with an eye on all North 
America, expressed the hope that war would ensue 
with both England and Mexico. 

"The destiny of the Republic," it stated, "is 
apparent to every eye. Texas Annexation must be 
consummated, and the immediate results of that 
event may only precipitate the subjugation of the 
whole continent, despite of all the opposing efforts 
of the despotic dynasties of Europe." 

Thus we were "destined" to have Mexico and 
Canada sometime; — why not now? The Wash- 
ington Union, the administration paper, while 
relations with England and Mexico were still unde- 
termined, expressed deep suspicion of Great 
Britain, and asserted that no nation could thwart 
American "destiny." 

"The march of the Anglo-Saxon race is onward. 
They must in the event, accomplish their destiny, — 
spreading far and wide the great principles of self- 
government, and who shall say how far they will 
prosecute the work?" 

Mingled with this emotion of destiny there was 
evident the appeal which the "West" made as a 



86 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

land of opportunity. A bit of verse appearing in 
a St. Louis paper was widely reprinted in the East : 

"Come out to the West."' 

" Come forth from your cities, come out to the West ; 
Ye have hearts, ye have hands — leave to Nature the rest. 
The prairie, the forest, the stream at command — 
'The world is too crowded !' — pshaw ! come and take 
land. 

" Come travel the mountain, and paddle the stream ; 
The cabin shall smile, and the corn-patch shall gleam; 
'A wife and six children?' — 'tis wealth in your hand! 
Your ox and your rifle — out West and take land !'* 

Possibly it was by such means that Martin Chuz- 
zlewit was induced to buy a corner lot in "Eden." 
The West had cast a glamor over the eyes of the 
nation, and the greater the distance, the more allur- 
ing the prospect. But with Oregon secured, and 
with Texas and California made definitely ours in 
the progress of the war with Mexico, Polk was 
satisfied and hastened the peace negotiations, that 
the fever of expansion should not rise too high. 
The Southern leaders were accustomed to bewail 
the fact that they would always be damned in his- 
tory, since the historical writing was all done in 
New England. The South has indeed been thus 
damned for the annexation of Texas and the 
Mexican War, but in the former case alone can the 
slavery interest be regarded as an important factor. 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 87 

Manifest destiny was the one great leading force 
in the war with Mexico. 

At the end of the war, except for the extreme 
anti-slavery faction, there was united glorification 
in the power, and in the territorial greatness of 
America. The emotion of manifest destiny was 
at its height. Foreign observers were astounded 
by the national self-confidence, and appalled by the 
actual power of the United States. Warburton, 
an English traveler, arriving in America "in igno- 
rance," as he himself says, went away astonished 
and fearful. 

"We cannot," he writes, "conceal from ourselves 
that in many of the most important points of 
national capabilities they beat us; they are more 
energetic, more enterprising, less embarrassed with 
class interests, less burthened by the legacy of debt. 
This country, as a field for increase of power, is 
in every respect so infinitely beyond ours that 
comparison would be absurd." . . . All things 
"combine to promise them, a few years hence, a 
degree of strength which may endanger the existing 
state of things in the world. They only wait for 
matured power, to apply the incendiary torch of 
Republicanism to the nations of Europe." 

Warburton overstates American desire to meddle 
in European affairs, yet he expresses American 
belief in the contagious qualities of the ideal of 
self-government. Witness our enthusiasm over the 
European revolutions of 1848, when press, pulpit. 



88 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

and Congress gave credit to American ideals and 
institutions, — being woefully ignorant of the many 
sources of the most confused revolutionary move- 
ment in history. Yet there is a touch of truth in 
the theory that the prosperity and power of 
America, looked upon as a test of the success of 
her democratic institutions, were an influence in 
expanding liberalism in Europe. Perhaps this was 
our most grandiloquent period. Here was this vast 
country, — its riches untold, seaports on two oceans, 
the one ideal form of government, and possibilities 
of power beyond telling. After the absorption of 
so much territory in so short a time, America 
summed up her material blessings and was satis- 
fied. But she hoped for dominion even beyond 
material things. A handful of people as compared 
with the great powers of Europe, she arrogated to 
herself leadership in the world of ideas, and pro- 
posed to make herself respected and feared in the 
family of Nations. Clay best expressed it in 1850, 
saying : 

"Our country has grown to a magnitude, to a 
power and greatness, such as to command the 
respect, if it does not awe the apprehensions of the 
powers of the earth, with whom we come in 
contact." 

The ebb of the tide of expansion craze began 
with the acquisition of the Pacific Coast. The 
discovery of gold in California drew in a new direc- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 89 

tion the bulk of that adventurous population which 
had heretofore worried our neighbors. Before that 
discovery, Polk, in 1847, had advocated a waterway 
across the Isthmus of Panama, and Francis Lieber 
urged America not to be afraid of her future, and 
to build the canal, writing: 

" Let the vastness not appal us ; 
Greatness is thy destiny. 
Let the doubters not recall us : 
Venture suits the free." 

The gold rush at once forced into prominence the 
question of transit by the Isthmus, and the Clayton- 
Bulwer treaty was signed with England, looking 
toward a canal. A ten-years' dispute as to the 
interpretation of that treaty followed, and Central 
America became the scene of a new "American 
movement," with William Walker, the "grey-eyed 
man of destiny," as the leading actor in filibustering 
expeditions, having for their object a tropical 
expansion, and finding favor in the South. Cuba 
also was an objective, but all this aftermath of the 
expansion craze was checked by the political exi- 
gencies of the dangerous situation within the United 
States, when the Kansas-Nebraska controversy 
arose. 

Meanwhile Americans, generally, were proudly 
conscious of power, and of territorial greatness, and 
were not unduly modest in expressing this con- 



90 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

sciousness. Manifest destiny has indeed a char- 
acteristic of American humor, — exaggeration. The 
EngHshman defined American humor as "merely a 
big lie," — but he missed the fact that, to the Ameri- 
can, the "big lie" was never quite an absolute 
impossibility. It was thus with the expression of 
the ideal of manifest destiny, — the bombast, how- 
ever apparently absurd, was never wholly insincere, 
though it was tinctured with the love of humorous 
exaggeration for its own sake. This puzzled the 
English observer and he sometimes took American 
talk at its face value, as when the House of Lords 
solemnly recorded its indignation at an American 
proposal to repudiate all debts to foreign nations, 
on the ground that such creditors were fully recom- 
pensed in having aided in the spread of American 
civilization. The editorial in a Dubuque, Iowa, 
paper that inspired this British protest was a mere 
blatant absurdity and the editor must have been 
gratified, if he knew of it, to find his effort per- 
petuated in the pages of Hansard's Parliamentary 
Debates. Charles Dickens, in "Martin Chuzzlewit," 
revelled in the opportunity to caricature our 
assumption of superiority, and of the all-pervading 
influence of our institutions. Martin, under the 
guidance of Colonel Diver, editor of the New York 
Rowdy Journal, has made the acquaintance of sev- 
eral of "the most remarkable men of the country, 
sir," and has been astounded by their youth. At 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 91 

the dinner table in the boarding house, he is equally 
astounded to learn that the "little girl, like a doll," 
seated opposite, is the mother of two children. He 
expresses his wonder to Colonel Diver, who replies, 
"Yes, Sir, but some institutions develop human 
nature; others re-tard it." More serious English 
writers, accepting American estimate of the power 
and future expansion of the United States, struck 
the note of "hands across the sea," and declared a 
common destiny for the two nations, each in its own 
field. Charles Mackay, the "Ayrshire Poet," read 
at a banquet in Washington a poem called "John 
and Jonathan," disclaiming for John any wish to 
interfere with Jonathan's destiny : 

" Take you the West and I the East, 
We'll spread ourselves abroad, 
With Trade and Spade, and wholesome laws, 
And faith in Man and God. 

" Take you the West and I the East, 

We speak the self -same tongue 
That Milton wrote and Chatham spoke, 

And Burns and Shakespeare sung; 
And from our tongue, our hand, our heart. 

Shall countless blessings flow 
To light two darkened hemispheres 

That know not where they go." 

The Civil War put a sudden end to the clamor for 
territorial expansion. The purchase of Alaska, in 
1867, awoke no enthusiasm in American hearts. 



92 ' THE POWER OF IDEALS 

It was generally spoken of as "Seward's Folly," and 
regarded as a recompense to Russia for her friendly 
attitude during the war. For thirty years America 
was occupied with industrial development, satisfied 
to retain for herself the blessing of her institutions, 
with no inclination to confer them by force on other 
nations. Then came the Spanish-American war. 
Whatever its origin, the war awoke again, but only 
for the moment, the emotion of manifest destiny. 
President McKinley, in a message to Congress, fol- 
lowing the cession of the Philippines by Spain, 
expressed the national sentiment: 

"The war," he said, "has brought us new duties 
and responsibilities which we must meet and dis- 
charge as becomes a great nation on whose growth 
and career from the beginning the Ruler of 
Nations has plainly written the high command and 
pledge of civilization. Incidental to our tenure 
in the Philippines is the commercial oppor- 
tunity to which American statesmanship cannot be 
indifferent." 

A shrill voice from the East protested, buti^these 
words express briefly the true inwardness of mani- 
fest destiny at all times in our history\ Even more 
briefly put they might be condensed to, "God directs 
us, — perhaps it will pay." 

sjt * * * ^ * 

If, in this lecture, I have seemed to present to 
you an ideal simply as a target for caricature and 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 93 

ridicule, I shall be unfair to my own conception of 
manifest destiny and its influence. It is true that, 
as an ideal embracing territorial expansion, I have 
little respect for it, though I do not agree with 
Lowell : 

" Thet all this big talk of our destinies 
Is half on it ign'ance and t'other half rum," 

for it can not be denied that always there was 
present a spiritual exaltation, and not only the 
assertion, but the conviction of the superiority of 
American institutions. But the taint of sordid 
motives was there too. There was a golden ideal 
in the emotion, but there was also an alloy of baser 
metals. This criticism should not, however, lessen 
emphasis upon the force of the ideal of manifest 
destiny in American history, for whatever its 
origin, or however used, the ideal existed of and 
by itself. No economic basis whatever can be 
found for it after the annexation of Texas, and 
even in that instance, the emotion played as great 
a part as industrial interests. It was a fever in the 
blood that steadily rose, and was allayed only by 
the letting of blood. 

In the introduction to this lecture I asserted that 
the westward movement, in and of itself, held no 
conscious ideal of a continent-wide destiny. Set- 
ting aside such a claim for that movement, there 
were, then, two phases of manifest destiny, — the 



94 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

earlier expressing merely the conviction of supe- 
riority in our form of government, and the greater 
happiness of our people; while the later phase 
carried with this belief the desire for new territory, 
and the responsibility of imposing upon other 
nations the benefits of our own. Present-day judg- 
ment repudiates the latter view, while holding firmly 
to the faith in our institutions, and to confidence in 
our future. In that ideal of manifest destiny, — a 
belief in our institutions, as the best in the world 
adapted to secure to our people "life, liberty, and 
the pursuit of happiness," — we may still assert our 
faith. But in relation to those nations whose 
boundaries touch our own, or in whose peace and 
prosperity we have an interest, let us agree with 
Joseph Gilder's vision of the duty of America: 

" Be thou the guardian of the weak, 
Of the unfriended, thou the friend; 

No guerdon for thy valor seek, 
No end beyond the avowed end 

Wouldst thou thy godlike power preserve, 

Be godlike in the will to serve." * 

* From Harper's Weekly. Copyright, 1900, by Harper 
& Brothers. 



IV 

RELIGION— A SERVICE 



I 



IV 
RELIGION— A SERVICE 

Unlike other ideals, religious conviction in the 
nineteenth century has not found expression in 
any one distinct movement, nor in any one period. 
It is rather a diffused force working in and through 
all other forces, — and thus difficult to isolate. 
Naturally and necessarily, I turn to church move- 
ments, and to the activities of the clergy, for illus- 
tration, yet it is the custom and conduct of the 
people, rather than the leadership of the pulpit, that 
is vital. 

In early colonial times church and state were so 
interwoven that religious expression and creeds 
were an essential part of citizenship. But with the 
spread of the principle of freedom of conscience, 
taking form in the separation of church and state, 
religion came to be regarded as something apart 
from the political life of the nation, and the pulpit 
as largely restricted from leadership in political 
action. This was an inevitable swing back of the 
pendulum from the point of clerical domination. 
The pulpit emphasized creed and dogma, devoting 
its mental energy to these topics, and paying little 
attention to acute questions of the day. The force 
of the clergy, in the affairs of state, disappeared. 



98 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

while to every church member the essential thing 
became the personal satisfaction derived from an 
accepted relation with God, looking toward happi- 
ness and perfection in a future life. This is not 
to say that conduct and character were neglected, 
nor that the broad term morality was divorced from 
civic duties. On the contrary, every religious- 
minded man sought to support his civic action by 
a reference to moral principles. Washington, in 
his farewell address, said, "I hold the maxim no 
less applicable to public than to private affairs, that 
honesty is always the best policy," and again, he 
stated, ''Virtue or morality is a necessary spring 
of popular government." But Washington would 
have been the last to acknowledge religious dogma 
as a complete guide to civic duty. The reaction 
from religious despotism was excessive. Wash- 
ington Irving, writing of the Puritan treatment of 
the Indians, has said, "They [the Indians] were 
sober, frugal, continent, and faithful to their word, 
but though they acted right habitually, it was all in 
vain unless they acted so by precept." The power 
of precept was still predominant in religion, but 
by the eighteenth century it had come to be limited 
to a profession of faith, and an observance of cus- 
tomary religious exercises. Neither pulpit nor 
people sought anxiously any longer for the expres- 
sion of their religious convictions in civic life. To 
nations where church and state still held a relation 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 99 

which America had discarded, the decay of prac- 
tical morality in America seemed inevitable. Such 
nations observed with scorn what seemed to them 
an irreconcilable contradiction between the keen 
business instincts of the Yankee, and his profes- 
sions of religion. One of the oldest British jibes 
at America pictures the Yankee storekeeper as 
instructing his clerk, preparing for the business 
of the morrow, to "sand the sugar, flour the ginger, 
lard the butter, and then come in to prayers." 

In summarizing American religion in the eight- 
eenth century, the church historian. Prof. Williston 
Walker, asserts that century to have been more 
barren than any other in our history, stating that 
the older devotion and the "sense of a national 
mission" were gone, and that everywhere, while 
religious services were still largely attended, this 
attendance was due to habit and to respect for 
external formality. This being true, the natural 
prelude to a revival of the force of religion in 
national life was a revolt from the despotism of 
dogma, and from the dwarfing influence of un- 
changing creeds. The period was one of idealism 
for individual liberty stated in terms of Jeffersonian 
democracy. More than a century and a half earlier 
the argument of Thomas Hooker for a democratic 
form of government in both church and state, was 
"embodied in January, 1639, in the fundamental 
laws or first constitution of Connecticut." 



100 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

"The foundation of authority is laid in the free 
consent of the people. The choice of the people's 
magistrates belongs to the people of God's own 
allowance. They who have the power to appoint 
magistrates have also the right to place bonds and 
limitations on the power and place unto which they 
call them." 

This was no declaration of individual liberty within 
the church, but, by 1800, the democracy of church 
organization — independence of the authority of a 
church hierarchy — had paved the way for liberty 
of conscience. This latter ideal was closely 
related, intellectually, to the ideals of Jeffersonian 
democracy. 

The most definite form in which individual reli- 
gious liberty now expressed itself was Unitarian- 
ism, with Channing as its prophet. Dr. Samuel 
Eliot has recently defined the fundamental prin- 
ciple of Unitarianism as "freedom as the way, and 
character as the test of religion." This, in sub- 
stance, was the essence of Jeffersonian democracy, 
also. In examining the origins of both Unita- 
rianism and democracy, one is struck by the simi- 
larity of the terms employed, as, for example, the 
"sovereign citizen" and the "sovereign soul." A 
basic principle in both movements was a belief in 
the natural instinct of man toward good, rather 
than evil. Thus the protest of Unitarianism 
against the doctrine of natural depravity, taken in 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 101 

connection with the assertion of individual liberty, 
made the Unitarian movement seem a part, — even 
a manifestation, of the nation-wide tendency in 
political thought. To foreign observers, especially 
those from England, seeking causes and foretelling 
results, it seemed a foregone conclusion that 
Unitarianism was to be the religion of America. 

Thomas Jefferson himself identified liberty in 
political and in religious faith. "Priests," using the 
term in the sense of a clergy claiming authority 
to determine creeds, Jefferson classified with 
"despots." "Sweep away," he wrote, "their gossa- 
mer fabrics of factitious religion, and they 
[priests] would catch no more flies," and he fully 
believed in the future of Unitarianism. Thus he 
said: 

"The pure and simple unity of the creator of the 
universe, is now all but ascendant in the Eastern 
States; it is dawning in the West, and advancing 
toward the South ; and I confidently expect that the 
present generation will see Unitarianism become the 
general religion of the United States." Again, he 
said : "I trust there is not a young man now living 
in the United States who will not die an Unitarian." 

I have no intention of dilating upon religious con- 
troversies, nor of examining in detail the actual 
extent and influence of the Unitarian faith per se. 
We are all aware that Unitarian church organiza- 
tion did not spread as Jefferson prophesied, and 



102 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

indeed, that such organization was largely limited 
to a small section of New England. There are 
those who claim that the Unitarian tenet, "liberty," 
is today a characteristic of all Protestant churches, 
and that in this respect Unitarian faith has become 
a national faith. They assert that Bushnell con- 
tributed to Congregationalism that individual liberty 
which Channing had proclaimed. But with this 
question I have no concern. All that I would here 
indicate is that the sense of 'liberty" — of breaking 
away from old traditions — was expressed at once, 
both in religion and in political theory. Nor were 
the religious leaders unconscious of this. Channing 
expressed it for himself in a line, when in 1830, 
distressed by the indifference of the young men 
of Harvard to the French revolution of that year, 
he recalled his own emotions in the earlier French 
revolution, and exclaimed that he was "always 
young for liberty." 

Just as liberty in religion was contemporary with 
the ideal of liberty through democracy, so the 
wonderful outburst of national church organiza- 
tions, and of humanitarian societies, was contem- 
porary with the outburst of the ideal of nationality. 
It has been stated in a previous lecture that the 
ideal of nationality flowered in 1815, thereafter 
steadily developing. Before 1815 there had been 
sporadic missionary and humanitarian effort by 
isolated churches, but only one effort on a large 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 103 

scale and that wholly altruistic rather than national. 
This was the American Board of Foreign Missions 
founded in 1810. But with the new sense of 
nationality came the vision of national religious 
effort. In 1816 the American Bible Society, pre- 
viously a local organization, was expanded into a 
national society. In 1824 came the Sunday School 
Union; in 1825 the American Tract Society; 1826 
saw the organization of the Home Missionary 
Society, and of the American Temperance Society. 
In 1828 an American Peace Society brought 
together in one national organization various local 
societies, among which was that of New York 
founded in 1815 by David Low Dodge. By 1830 
this national religious movement was in full swing, 
though later years were to witness a marvelous 
expansion. 

Here, then, as in the case of Unitarianism, reli- 
gious expression coincided in its ideals with other 
national ideals. Yet judged by the sermons of the 
clergy, religion in America, while democratic in 
organization, while sharing in the ideal of personal 
liberty, and while participating in the ideal of 
nationality, was still largely dominated by the theory 
that it was something distinct and apart from 
active life, — a theory, in short, which emphasized 
a future life at the expense of the present. The 
pulpit still dwelt, to the exclusion of applied reli- 
gion, upon the personal relation with God, with 



104 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

personal salvation as its object. I do not wish to 
overemphasize this, but such study as I have been 
able to give to the period from 1830 to 1850 has 
convinced me that formal religion did not then 
lead in the world of ideals, nor even in the true 
moral purpose of a people eagerly seeking spiritual 
growth. 

This conservatism of the pulpit might be illus- 
trated by quotations from many sermons in which 
it was sought to combat all tendencies to the new 
either in theology or in religious expression, while 
the real business of the churches was asserted to 
be strictly limited to keeping alive man's conscious- 
ness of his spiritual relation to God. I do not 
suppose that today the parents of the young man 
about to enter college give him as a parting present 
Todd's "Students Manual," — a very wise, and a 
very practical guide to conduct, — but in the period 
of which I write, and long after, it was a frequent 
gift. Now the Rev. John Todd was a noted clergy- 
man, and one might expect after reading his 
"Students Manual" that he, at least, would have 
appreciated the opportunity offered to the pulpit for 
leadership in those new manifestations of moral 
consciousness animating the nation. Yet in 1833 
he preached a sermon, entitled "The Pulpit. — Its 
Influence upon Society," which so clearly epitomizes 
the attitude of the bulk of the Protestant clergy that 
I cannot refrain from citing at least the heads of 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 105 

his discourse. The central thread of the sermon 
is that the chief service of the pulpit is confined to 
teaching man's relation to God, personal piety, and 
the hope of a future life, but in expanding this 
thought the preacher stated the function of the 
pulpit in specific fields: Firstly, the pulpit acts as 
the preserver of the Christian Sabbath, and incul- 
cates a knowledge of the Scriptures. Secondly, the 
pulpit emphasizes the personal relation between God 
and man, and especially tends to convince man that 
God's eye is constantly upon him, judging his 
actions. Thirdly, the pulpit provides the best type 
of education for the youth of the land. Here the 
preacher referred to that education pursued in the 
pastor's study by boys preparing for college, and 
he strongly opposed the system of high schools 
then springing up in New England, stating that the 
proposed specialization of a teaching profession 
"would have one capital deficiency. They [the 
teachers] would understand human nature only as 
seen in the language and the history of the dead, 
and as seen in books." Fourthly, the pulpit pre- 
serves and makes proper use of the art of eloquence. 
Fifthly, the pulpit more than any other institution 
performs the service of "calling man into social, 
national, and religious existence." I would that 
the preacher had expanded his fifthly into many 
sermons, but he was content with a generalization 
in the briefest of all his "heads," and in conclusion 



106 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

he reiterated the prevaiHng thought throughout, — 
the duty of the pulpit to interpret and perpetuate 
reUgious faith expressed in creed, that church 
members, obedient in conduct to such creed, might 
share in a future hfe of hoHness and bUss. His 
concluding words, apostrophizing the service of the 
pulpit and the church, were : 

"Here may our children and our children's chil- 
dren, to the latest posterity, come and be taught the 
way of eternal life. . . . When our heads are pil- 
lowed in the grave, and others have followed us 
here and filled these seats and retired, when these 
walls shall have crumbled to the dust, . . . may 
they, and we, all meet to rejoice together forever 
and forever." 

We also believe that religion necessarily must 
emphasize future life, and that the source of all 
moral motive, all high ideals, all humanitarian 
efifort, all progress, rests in such a belief. All that 
I would here indicate is that one's personal salva- 
tion, to be secured by an acceptance of a faith, was 
still emphasized in this period, to the sacrifice of 
religious service in this life. The egotism of 
religious conviction still overshadowed its altruism. 
If we examine the columns of the newspapers 
from 1830 to 1840, we will find a curious evidence, 
in the advertisements of books on religion, of the 
persistence of the extreme Puritan attitude and 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 107 

language. In the National Intelligencer for July 
10, 1838, there appears the following: 

"James's Anxious Enquirer'' 

"The anxious Enquirer after Salvation. Directed 
and Encouraged, by John Angell James, new 
edition. Price 50 cents." 

The same thought, and the same relation of church 
member and pastor, is indicated in this advertise- 
ment as in the sermon of the Rev. John Todd. 
Soon, however, the ideal of democracy would for- 
bid to the clergy such superior authority. Oliver 
Wendell Holmes, though with a different meaning, 
puts in a nut-shell the equality of priest and layman, 
when, describing the visit of the divinity student 
to the sick chamber of the cripple, he wrote : 

" 'Shall I pray with you ?' said the student ; a 
little before he would have said, 'Shall I pray for 
you?'" 

The relation of the ideals of democracy and of 
religious expression has frequently been commented 
upon by historians, when comparing the appearance 
of Jacksonian, as distinguished from Jeffersonian, 
democracy, with the rapid growth in the West of 
the Methodist and Baptist denominations, for the 
members of these churches were drawn to them. 



108 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

in part, by a common equality of industrial and 
intellectual simplicity. But more important than 
this, in an analysis of the force of the ideal of 
religion, is the renewal of contact between religious 
observance and everyday life. It was in the West, 
and in all denominations, that the churches began 
to resume a spiritual leadership in the intimate 
affairs of the nation. An English Congregational 
clergyman, visiting America in 1833, was startled 
in Cincinnati on witnessing a Fourth of July cele- 
bration in which the trade organizations of the city 
marched with banners and cheering to the church, 
under Lyman Beecher's pastorate, listened to a 
brief patriotic sermon and then entered on the cus- 
tomary celebration of Independence Day. He 
described the scene as an "extraordinary mixture 
of the secular and the spiritual ; and it was a ques- 
tion whether the tendency was not to make religion 
worldly, rather than the worldly religious." But 
on reflection he concluded that the Western 
preacher was in the right, stating "Our true wis- 
dom, in consulting the good of the people, lies, not 
in excluding their secular concerns and pleasures 
from religion, but in diffusing religion through the 
whole of them." 

In the West there was indeed a greater intimacy 
between pulpit and people, a closer contact between 
church and civic society than existed in the East. 
In the West there had now developed, also, a reli- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 109 

gious movement intimately related to, and vitally 
affecting, national ideals. Initiated when the ideal 
of nationality began to grip American sentiment. 
Home Missions passed through a period of slow- 
development until, about 1840, the opening of new 
and easier routes had brought a rapid increase of 
Western population. The Eastern churches, espe- 
cially those of New England, responded to the call 
of Home Missions for aid in carrying the religious 
ideals of the East to this new Western land. The 
burden of that call was that the West must be 
made one with the East in religious faith and life, 
thus emphasizing still the primary object of pre- 
serving the ancient doctrines of the churches. But 
in the hearts of young men this call was effective, 
and consciously so, because of an enthusiasm for 
the ideal of nationality, while, though unconsciously 
at first, the ideal of active service in everyday 
living was forced upon the Home Missionary 
preacher, by the very conditions of his participation 
in the westward movement. If I were here to 
follow the method previously used in these lectures, 
and seek illustrations in the history of Yale College, 
and its inspirations, there would be no lack of great 
names and great enterprises to record. Yale was 
one of the two main sources of this religious cru- 
sade. But, born and educated in a state where I 
have not merely read, but know, the characteristics 
and influence of Home Missions, I turn for illus- 



110 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

tration to that other main spring of Home Mis- 
sionary effort, Andover Theological Seminary, and 
to that group of young ministers leaving its halls, 
the Iowa Band, whose history, as has been well 
said, portrays "the romance of home missions." 
Let me tell, very briefly, what the Iowa Band was 
and what it did. 

At Andover, in the spring of 1843, three young 
theological students were attracted by the idea of 
working together and in some new field. Looking 
over the ground they hit upon Iowa as practically 
virgin soil, and as graduation approached, their 
number had increased to eleven, animated by the 
inspiration of united religious service. On October 
4, 1843, ten of them began the journey west, travel- 
ing by rail to Buffalo, thence by the lakes to 
Chicago, and then in wagons to the Mississippi, 
which they crossed in a canoe on October 23, — a 
total journey of nineteen days. From the six mis- 
sionaries already in Iowa, they received a hearty 
welcome. Iowa was then a territory, the first white 
settlement dating but ten years earlier, in 1833. The 
only portion of the territory open to settlement was 
a strip about forty miles wide and two hundred 
miles long, bordering on the Mississippi. The 
population in 1840 was 42,500, of whom not over 
2,000 were professing Christians. Here the Iowa 
Band was to labor, and it is of interest to note that, 
undecided when leaving Andover as to church 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 111 

organization, they almost immediately determined 
upon the Congregational form, as best adapted to 
the democratic instincts of a frontier community. 
It was not an easy task these young ministers, 
reared in cultured Eastern families, and trained in 
Eastern college halls, found facing them. A com- 
plete and rapid readjustment of the whole ministe- 
rial point of view was necessary. One of them had 
thought out his plan of living in advance. "I am 
going to Iowa," he said, "and, when I get there, I 
am going to have my study and library. Then I 
am going to write two sermons a week ; and, when 
the Sabbath comes, I am going to preach them, and 
the people, if they want the gospel, must come to 
hear." His first home was in a Christian house- 
hold where there was but one living room, in a 
corner of which, partitioned by a quilt, he found his 
study and bedroom ; and his study chair was a 
saddle, for he had to seek his hearers, not they 
him. Travel was on foot or horseback, by Indian 
trails or blazed trees. It was a rude awakening 
from the dream of a settled pastorate. All expe- 
rienced it, were dismayed at first, then took courage 
and soon rejoiced in the very crudity of a life 
offering opportunity to initiative and enterprise. 
They even commiserated their friends in the East 
for the quiet and humdrum character of their 
lives. Also they asserted that by environment they 
were "compelled to grow in mental strength, energy, 



112 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

breadth of views and high Christian aims." In 
answer to the argument of deprivation from the 
"privileges of refined society," they repHed: "In 
your refined society, so-called, there is much that 
is artificial, formal, and sometimes hollow. We 
have learned that there is such a thing as being 
civilized and refined almost to death." The writer 
of these words, perhaps the most gentle and 
courteous member of the band, unconsciously 
reflected the very essence of the ideal qualities of 
democracy in the westward movement. Religion 
was renewing its vigor in this new nation of the 
West. 

One can easily picture the joys of these young 
men in the opportunities of this young state. They 
were to mould Iowa in Christianity and they 
labored even to the limits of strength. The wife 
of one member, fragile, never suited physically to 
the hardships of frontier life, when urged to limit 
her exertions, answered, "Somebody must be built 
into these foundations," — and this saying became 
almost a text for those who survived her. The 
great object was to establish churches, and one 
historian has written "no equal number of young 
ministers, leaving a theological seminary together, 
ever founded so many churches in five or ten years 
after their graduation as these men." But they 
felt equally the call of education, and even before 
leaving Andover one had said, "If each one of us 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 113 

can only plant one good permanent church, and all 
together build a college, what a work that would 
be." Less than six months after the Band reached 
Iowa, a ministers' meeting was called to discuss 
the founding of a college, and already imbued with 
Western enterprise, it was proposed to locate public 
lands, "boom" a college town, and thus provide the 
institution with funds. Eastern support was urged 
and denied for this real-estate enterprise, so the 
more cautious policy was followed of soliciting 
funds sufficient actually to start a college. By 
1846, three years after reaching Iowa, a small fund 
having been raised, a college organization was per- 
fected, one of the would-be land boomers putting 
a dollar on the table, saying, "Now appoint your 
trustees to take care of that dollar for Iowa Col- 
lege." In 1848 the college was established at 
Davenport, with one building costing $2000. In 
1859 it was removed to a more central location at 
Grinnell, and, participating in the industrial devel- 
opment of the state, has become one of its 
strongest educational institutions. 

It is impossible to do more than indicate in out- 
line the influence of this home missionary move- 
ment in Iowa, stirred into vigor by the Band, and 
exercising a moral influence on every aspect of 
religious, social and political life. To all later 
workers in Iowa home missions, the Band set the 
standard of fearlessness in applying their religion 



114 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

to political issues. When they arrived in 1843, the 
agitation for statehood was just coming to the 
front, and soon the question of slavery was up for 
discussion in the territorial legislature. In the three 
years before statehood came, these young ministers 
boldly preached their faith in anti-slavery, — one of 
them had been, indeed, a member of that boys' 
abolition society which resulted in expulsion from 
Phillips Andover Academy. In the lecture on anti- 
slavery, I referred to a statement made by a speaker 
at the recent Historical Association meeting in 
Boston to the effect that in the years preceding the 
Civil War, pulpit utterances and church sentiment 
were opposed to the anti-slavery agitation. As to 
pulpit utterances available for study in the sermons 
of noted preachers, I have no comprehensive knowl- 
edge, but it would be an error in historical investi- 
gation to take the sermons of noted preachers as 
prQQf of the attitude of the bulk of the clergy, — 
the preachers in the small country church. One 
might get the impression from the card catalogue 
of Yale library that all the ministers of New Eng- 
land always printed all of their sermons. But this 
was not so in the West, and for Congregationalism 
in Iowa, — the dominating and all-powerful home 
missionary religious influence in that state, — I know 
that the whole tradition of the state asserts the 
moulding force of the country pastors in the anti- 
slavery agitation. For written proof of this tradi- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 115 

tion the historical investigator has but to turn to 
the minutes and resolutions of the annual asso- 
ciation of the Congregational churches. There he 
will find, each year, resolutions adopted urging the 
ministers to attack intemperance, slavery, the 
Mexican War, national disruption threats, and like 
subjects. Religion, in this westv^^ard movement, 
did dare to apply to civic questions its ideals of 
moral conduct. Of one member of the Iowa Band, 
whose glory it was that in his old age he was 
known as "Father" to the people of Iowa, it was 
said, "no man, living or dead, has done more for 
Iowa than this good man." 

The story of the Iowa Band is exceptional, 
because of its romantic inception, and vigorous 
labors in stirring times. It is, however, but one 
illustration of the great wave of home missionary 
energy expended in the new Western states, and I 
have told the story badly if it has not been made 
clear that here was a new attitude and a new 
emphasis in religious expression. Possibly, rather, 
I should term it a renewed attitude and emphasis. 
The home missionaries did not alter their creeds, — 
indeed, they often went out purposely to combat 
religious vagaries in creed. But they broke 
through the barrier that had separated the pulpit 
from the pew, prayed with their people, shared in 
their emotions and their ideals. This was the new 
attitude. The new emphasis lay in the placing of 



116 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

service above pulpit instruction. It came unsought, 
perhaps even unwelcomed, and was still largely 
unrecognized as the highest ideal of religion. But 
the germ of it sprouted in home missions. 

This great religious movement was continued 
with energy up to the Civil War, and religion fur- 
nished moral ideals preparatory for the part the 
West was to play in that war. During its progress 
the pulpit everywhere again produced great spiritual 
leaders, inspired by national and moral ideals. War, 
it is claimed, always brings to the anxious watchers 
in the home a revival of religious emotion. What- 
ever the merits of this generalization, it is certain 
that during the Civil War, in both North and 
South, such a revival did occur, and that the pulpit 
renewed its vigor in spiritual leadership. I have not 
time even to enumerate the famous preachers of this 
day, and in illustration name but two, both of whom 
struck their highest note in expressing the ideal 
of nationality. Henry Ward Beecher, an eloquent 
and stirring pulpit orator, a moral guide to his 
people, was sent to England in 1863 to proclaim the 
ideals of anti-slavery and nationality for which 
the North was struggling. Thomas Starr King, 
whose name is still foremost in California as her 
"preacher patriot," by his enthusiasm and oratory 
in the crisis of 1861, impressed upon the state the 
indelible stamp of his spiritual leadership. He felt 
with all his soul the cause for the Union. Not a 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 117 

vigorous man, physically, he persisted in his labors 
in spite of the entreaties of friends, avowing that 
he had "enlisted for the war," and he did not sur- 
vive to see its conclusion. These men, and many 
others, illustrate an unusual pulpit leadership in an 
unusual emergency. They used religion as a force 
in support of the ideal of nationality. 

Like illustrations of the intensity of religious 
feeling and patriotism might be given for the 
South, though not from the lips of equally re- 
nowned preachers. The South also believed in the 
moral justice of its cause. But when the war had 
ended there came over the spirit of the reunited 
nation a sense of lethargy in ideals, whatever their 
nature. Nationality was reestablished, but for other 
causes there was little enthusiasm. This was 
partly due to the exhaustion of emotion in the war, 
partly to the pressing necessity for industrial 
recuperation. For a time anti-slavery sentiment, 
fearing a virtual renewal of Southern slavery by 
labor laws, was kept alive in the reconstruction 
troubles. But by 1875, when it was seen that the 
South had no intention of reenslaving the negro, 
this ideal had waned also. The centennial cele- 
bration of 1876 was the occasion of much patriotic 
writing, expressing devout thankfulness for the 
mercies of Providence to America, and voicing 
faith in divine guidance. In his Centennial Hymn, 
Whittier wrote: 



118 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

" Our fathers' God ! from out whose hand 
The centuries fall like grains of sand, 
We meet to-day, united, free, 
And loyal to our land and Thee, 
To thank Thee for the era done. 
And trust Thee for the opening one. 

" Oh make Thou us, through centuries long, 
In peace secure, in justice strong; 
Around our gift of freedom draw 
The safeguards of Thy righteous law; 
And, cast in some diviner mould, 
Let the new cycle shame the old." 

But such faith and hope lacked living stimulus. 
The nation was apparently without ideals, save 
those of industrial progress. Religion shared in 
this apathy, spending its energy in seizing what it 
could of the tide of national prosperity, erecting 
splendid church edifices, and, as the close personal 
contact of the pioneer days was lost in the growth 
of towns and cities, retreating to the stronghold 
of religious dogma. But creeds no longer satisfied 
the ideals of the spirit. There was no living interest 
in them, — no demand for a change of articles of 
faith. This was so much true that today we find 
it difficult to understand the heart-searchings, and 
the doctrinal disputes that enlivened colonial times, 
and even the earlier nineteenth century. Creeds, 
it is often said, are the product of both religious 
thought and religious feeling, and the time had 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 119 

now come in America when the appeal of reHgion 
as a system of thought had lost its force. 

The pulpit was the first to recover from this 
stagnant period in American idealism. Searching 
its own heart, and eager for a restored influence, 
it turned to that second element of religious life, 
never wholly lacking, but long overshadowed by 
doctrinal dispute, — the religious feeling of man- 
kind, — the inherent necessity in every man's soul 
of expressing his sense of a relationship to a divine 
being, and a divine purpose. Up to this point I 
have sought to trace the force of religion in America 
in terms limited to Protestant faith and Protestant 
expression, and this is historically correct, for that 
faith alone had an intimate relationship to the other 
American ideals of the times. Other faiths had 
meanwhile gained adherents, notably Catholicism, 
but had been compelled to struggle for a right to 
exist, against the Protestant traditions, and had 
spent their energies in that contest. But Protestant 
prejudice, roused to extreme intolerance in the 
so-called ''Know Nothing" political movement of 
the fifties, seeking to damn as "un-American" all 
other faiths, had fought and lost its battle. Free- 
dom of conscience, in whatever faith, had 
triumphed, and all faiths now shared in the new 
endeavor to reanimate religion, placing a minor 
emphasis on an accepted system of religious 
thought, and appealing directly to the sense, or 



120 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

feeling of religion. Thus seeking for a restored 
influence, the pulpit, of whatever denomination or 
creed, offered service by man to man. This was 
not a new offering; it had always been present in 
religious teaching, but it was now given a place 
never before known in American history. 

Let us review, briefly, the force of religion in 
our national ideals in the nineteenth century. It 
has been noted that democratic political institu- 
tions followed after, and were partly derived from 
democratic church organization. Then came the 
parallel development in church and state, of the 
ideals of personal liberty, each operating inde- 
pendently, yet each influencing the other. Next, 
followed the religious participation in nationality, 
both inspired by it, and contributing to it, — and 
later sharing as well in the ideals of anti-slavery 
and manifest destiny. In all of these ideals, reli- 
gious conviction was present, and in some it led. 

The purpose, and the limits of this lecture, 
devoted to the force of the ideal of religion, have 
not permitted me to dilate upon the changing 
aspects of the American theory of religion, but 
throughout, and in the summary just made, I have 
at least hinted at what I conceive these changes to 
have been, and to what conclusions they have now 
been brought. In my view, the religious instinct 
of mankind, during the nineteenth century in 
America, has been struggling to escape from the 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 121 

thrall of dogmatic theology, while an American 
ideal of religion was fortunately preserved by the 
participation of religion in the advance of democ- 
racy and nationality. But it is only today that we 
see clearly what has been the meaning of this 
century-long struggle, — what is, in truth, the 
essence of American religion. I find it best stated 
in the words of an English Roman Catholic, 
William Barry, though in some minor phrases, one 
can not agree. He writes: 

"Americans once believed with shuddering in 
man's total depravity, from which only the small 
number of the elect were redeemed. They now 
believe that man is by nature good, by destiny per- 
fect, and quite capable of saving himself. But in 
a sort of 'ideal America' they recognize the motive 
power of this more humane life toward which they 
ought ceaselessly to be tending. The Common- 
wealth is their goal, business their way to heaven, 
progress their duty, free competition their method. 
Mystery, obedience, self-denial are repugnant to 
them. But they admire self-discipline when it 
rejects what is beneath man's dignity, or, in defer- 
ence to a fine idea, practices temperance. They 
are a breed of heroes rather than ascetics;" . . . 
To the American *'The Divine Power is his Friend, 
not his Fate; and his belief in human nature as 
something of intrinsic value, to be made perfect 
hereafter, is the free acceptance of a Divine Idea 
which it is man's duty to realize. Thus civilization 
and Religion are but different facets of the same 
glory." 



122 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

The full significance of this, the author's conclusion 
of his remarkable essay on "The Religion of 
America," can not be fully grasped in a single 
reading. In this lecture I have attempted to 
indicate historically the persistence throughout of 
the two basic truths in American religion, — faith 
in a Divine Idea, and a sense of duty to realize that 
idea, — expressing itself today in terms of humanity 
and service. 

In the field of civic life and responsibility the 
ideal of religion was the first among American 
ideals to renew its vigor after the Civil War. It 
blazed the path guiding the nation to that sense 
of humanity which is today its highest ideal. 
There are those who still assert the decadence of 
religion as a force in American life. If I read his- 
tory aright, it has always been a force, and in the 
last forty years has led men to a new and higher 
moral and civic consciousness. Whence came the 
wonderful modern development of societies and 
movements seeking to better the physical condition 
and enlarge the spiritual horizon of one's fellow 
men? From what initial energy sprang the settle- 
ment centers, self-help clubs, charitable societies, 
mission chapels, night schools. Christian associa- 
tions, and all the rest of that long list of organi- 
zations rejoicing in service? From pulpit leadership 
and from religious feeling. One great recognized 
ideal of America today is service, and it is an active 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 123 

force, everywhere that thoughtful and spiritual- 
minded men work, in the professions, in business, 
in labor, in politics. Whatever the alleged vagaries 
or reactions of political parties, however distrustful 
one political leader may be of the sincerity of 
another, the fact remains that all parties and all 
leaders today claim an ideal quality for their poli- 
cies, all assert that they would serve their fellow 
men, and all are truly animated by higher moral 
and political standards. The pulpit initiated the 
modern expression of this ideal ; it met instant and 
ever increasing response in the nation's religious 
instincts ; today service is the keynote of American 
religion. 

" O land of hope ! thy future years 

Are shrouded from our mortal sight; 
But thou canst turn the century's fears 
To heralds of a cloudless light! 



" O Spirit of immortal truth, 

Thy power alone that circles all 
Can feed the fire as in its youth — 
Can hold the runners lest they fall!"* 

If churches, with spire, a church bell, and a per- 
manent pastor, alone indicate the proportion of 
the people influenced by religious motive, it may 
be that religion has not kept pace with national 

* "After the Centennial," by Christopher Pearce Cranch. 



124 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

growth. I have made no comparison of statistics. 
But the instinct and the practice of service is first 
and always based on a sense of religion, — on a 
faith in divine purpose and in immortality. With- 
out this faith, — driven to pessimism by the meagre 
results of the labors of one short life, — they would 
be few indeed who would follow the banner of 
service. But it is not the few today in America 
who follow that banner. The leaders are many, and 
the army is a multitude. Religion is still a National 
ideal. And in conclusion I venture a quotation, 
possibly become a commonplace to you here at Yale, 
but read with inspiration by one to whom it was 
unfamiliar, as embodying for us who constitute the 
rank and file of this army, the ideal of religion in 
service. On the tomb of Elihu Yale, in Wrexham 
Church Yard, North Wales, are these lines: 

" Born in America, in Europe bred, 
In Africa travell'd, and in Asia wed, 
Where long he liv'd and thriv'd; in London dead. 
Much good, some ill, he did; so hope all's even, 
And that his soul thro' mercys gone to Heavn. 
You that survive and read this tale, take care. 
For this most certain exit to prepare : 
Where blest in peace, the actions of the just 
Smell sweet, and blossom in the silent dust." 



V 
DEMOCRACY— A VISION 



V 
DEMOCRACY— A VISION 

Whereas in discussing other ideals, it has seemed 
necessary to prove their existence and force, in the 
present case both may be taken for granted. 
Democracy, as a powerful ideal, is acknowledged 
by all to have been a steady force in our history for 
over a hundred years, and is still a term of national 
inspiration. Mr. Justice Hughes, in his lectures 
on the Dodge Foundation in 1909, said : 

/ "His study of history and of the institutions of 

/his country has been to little purpose if the college 

/ man has not caught the vision of Democracy and 

I has not been joined by the troth of heart and con- 

\ science to the great human brotherhood which is 

\ working out its destiny in this land of opportunity." 

\ 

The power of this ideal, I therefore take for 

granted. I ask your attention rather to the 

meaning of Democracy as an American vision, 

seeking to note the changing aspects of that vision, 

and the conditions of such change. 

The sources of the theory of democracy, — its 
origins, are to be found in religious faiths, and 
in America church organization paved the way for 



128 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

the application of the theory to government. But 
as a cult, the theory undoubtedly first found ade- 
quate expression amongst us in the writings of 
Thomas Paine. The appeal made by his works 
was due to a remarkable combination of clear state- 
ment, vigorous and attractive writing, and a deduc- 
tion from which there was no escape — provided one 
granted his premises. Just arrived from England, 
he published in 1776 his pamphlet "Common 
Sense." It attracted instant attention, and 120,000 
copies were sold in less than three months. His 
biographer, Cheetham, seeking constantly to belittle 
Paine's influence, yet says of ''Common Sense": 

''Speaking a language which the colonists had 
felt but not thought, its popularity, terrible in its 
consequences to the parent country, was unex- 
ampled in the history of the press." 

Long afterwards, Edmund Randolph analyzed 
Paine's influence as due to "an imagination which 
happily combined political topics," to a style new on 
this side the Atlantic, and to sentiments already 
germinating in American hearts. In 1790, having 
returned to England, Paine wrote "The Rights of 
Man" in answer to Burke on the French revolution. 
Again he displayed a wonderful capacity to unite 
ideals and close logic. In these two books Paine 
was then the first to state the ideal of democracy, 
as it later came to be accepted in America under 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 129 

the leadership of Jefferson, though the poHtical 
beHefs of the latter were independently developed 
and can not be ascribed directly to the influence of 
Paine's writings. 

The patriotic orator fondly ascribes to the 
Declaration of Independence the ideals of democ- 
racy, finding them in the phrases : 

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all 
men are created equal ; that they are endowed by 
their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that 
among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness." 

The men who signed that declaration, however, 
were far from intending a profession of faith either 
in the absolute equality of mankind, or even in the 
equality of political rights. If they had sought at 
all to elucidate their meaning, they would have 
stated it in terms of equality before the law. Not 
even Jefferson was prepared for human equality. 
The declaration was rather, as it has been aptly 
characterized, a campaign document, setting forth 
certain attractive generalities intended to arouse 
popular support, and enumerating specific griev- 
ances against King George III. The vital demo- 
cratic sentiment of America was not aroused, in 
fact, until at least twenty years after the Declara- 
tion of Independence, and the one principle of that 
earlier platform, then elevated to the dignity of a 



130 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

creed, was that of "liberty," with Jefferson as its 
high priest. 

Ever since 1800 the name of Thomas Jefferson 
has been associated with democracy, both as an 
ideal in itself, and as an ideal form of government. 
What then was his vision of democracy? It was 
simply a faith in personal liberty as the highest 
guiding principle in the progress of civilization. 
This was the center and sum of his entire phi- 
losophy. His purpose was, always and ever, to 
guard the liberty of the individual. He had no vital 
conception of the force of those other catch-words 
of the French revolution, — "equality," and "frater- 
nity." Contrary to the accusations of his political 
opponents, he was not a disciple of French phi- 
losophy, though his residence in France, and his 
habit of mind, gave him a clear view of the inner 
meaning of the French revolution, and made him 
tolerant of its crudities. This, then, being his 
vision of democracy, he found in popular sover- 
eignty and the rule of the majority, the govern- 
mental principles most likely to secure the ideal 
of personal liberty. 

This vision, and this medium of realization, are 
constantly reiterated in all that Jefferson wrote, or 
said, or did. Yet Jefferson's writings, frequently 
spoken of as if they constituted volumes of a care- 
fully organized philosophy, are, in fact, save for 
one book and a few state papers, merely a collection 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 131 

of his thirty thousand private letters. The book 
is his "Notes on Virginia," while the Declaration of 
Independence, two inaugural addresses, and several 
state papers make up the sum of his formal writing. 
Nevertheless it is not inaccurate to speak of the 
influence of Jefferson's writings, for in truth they 
have been a greater force in American political 
thinking than all the publications of all the other 
presidents combined, simply because he set up the 
one single ideal of liberty in government and in 
religion, and never wavering from it in theory 
(though at times inconsistent in practice), con- 
stantly drove it home in intimate talk and corre- 
spondence. Jefferson prided himself on the fear- 
lessness of his thought, stating that he "never 
feared to follow truth and reason, to whatever 
results they led, and bearding every authority which 
stood in their way," but he rarely put that thought 
into formal writing. At his first inauguration, 
however, March 4, 1801, he stated his principles. 
Pleading for good temper and conciliation in 
political controversies, which he contended were 
but ephemeral matters, he turned to liberty as the 
one desirable object of all government. This, he 
said, is to be secured by "absolute acquiescence in 
the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of 
republics, from which there is no appeal but to 
force, the vital principle and immediate parent of 
despotism." 



132 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

I suppose that today nine tenths of those who 
talk of Jeffersonian democracy, postulate the Jeffer- 
sonian theory in terms of their own conceptions. 
Men once talked of "natural rights," — and ascribed 
to nature their own mental visions. Just so, today, 
men attribute to Jefferson their own ideals of 
democracy. But to Jefferson, let it be repeated, the 
object of government was to secure the liberty of 
the individual, the only side of the prism which he 
saw clearly, — and democratic government was to 
him but the best method of realizing that ideal. 
Such government was not to him a perfect thing 
in itself, was not an Utopia. I have just quoted 
his words on the rule of majorities, but these did 
not imply Jefferson's belief that the decision of 
the majority was necessarily right. To believe that, 
is to believe in democracy as Utopia. In this same 
inaugural address he said: 

"All too will bear in mind this sacred principle, 
that though the will of the majority is in all cases 
to prevail, that will, to be rightful must be reason- 
able ; that the minority possess their equal rights 
which equal laws must protect, and to violate which 
would be oppression." 

John Fiske has compressed Jefferson's theory of 
government into the statement that he had "strong 
faith in the teachableness of the great mass of the 
people." Such faith implies a belief in the wisdom 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 133 

of universal suffrage, but this is not at all to believe 
that "the voice of the people is the voice of God." 
And Jefferson himself indicated democratic govern- 
ment as merely a form preferable to other forms, 
when he stated : 

"Sometimes it is said, that man cannot be trusted 
with the government of himself. Can he then be 
trusted with the government of others? Or, have 
we found angels in the form of kings^^to govern 
him? Let history answer this question." 

Jefferson's vision of democracy was of one ideal — 
liberty, and of a form of government which, judged 
by history, not by any theory of natural right, was 
best suited to that ideal. If I have been unduly 
repetitious in stating this, let the excuse be the later 
error, that Jefferson proposed to find an Utopia in 
democracy. 

Opposed to the theory that democracy was the 
handservant of liberty, there existed, in 1800, a 
sincere behef with some, that aristocratic govern- 
ment, or the government of the wise, was to be 
preferred, in the cause of this same liberty. The 
political success of Jefferson seemed to mark a 
backward rather than a forward step. Fisher 
Ames said in 1803 : 

"Our country is too big for Union, too sordid for 
patriotism, too democratic for liberty. ... Its 



134 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

vice will govern it by practising upon its folly. 
This is ordained for democracies." 

But in spite of prophecies of evil the nation found 
inspiration in Jefferson's theories, and from his 
time on, has held them as a faith. New attributes 
were added in the popular mind, and that of 
equality, at least of equality of opportunity, soon 
came to exercise a more powerful influence in sup- 
port of the ideal, than that of liberty. America 
had, indeed, a very confused notion of what it meant 
in acclaiming democracy. Nationality, special des- 
tiny, religious and political liberty, equality of 
opportunity, industrial prosperity, were all jumbled 
in the idealization of that democracy which 
America alone was held to possess. To most 
foreign visitors about 1830, America seemed to have 
gone mad in a craze for democracy, as necessarily 
the wisest and best type of government. Captain 
Hall summed up his argument against this faith 
by citing a part of the thirty-eighth chapter of the 
Book of Ecclesiasticus, in the Apocrypha, beginning, 

"The wisdom of a learned man cometh by oppor- 
tunity of leisure; and he that hath little business 
shall become wise." 

"How can he get wisdom that holdeth the plough, 
and that glorieth in the goad ? That driveth oxen, 
and is occupied in their labours, and whose talk is 
of bullocks?" 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 135 

This thought is always a common one to con- 
servative and cultivated men, who exalt good 
administration as the end of all government. The 
answer for democracy is that even though there 
be a poorer administration and a seeming slower 
progress (though this is usually denied), the free- 
dom of a democratic government from violent 
upheavals, — its safety-valve qualities, — make it in 
the long run the superior medium of development. 
But the American people of 1830 did not content 
themselves with any such defense of democracy. 
Jacksonian democracy clamorously proclaimed its 
faith, and sincerely believed that in the election of 
its hero, the nation has been torn from the control 
of an aristocratic and moneyed class. Webster 
wrote of Jackson's inauguration : "I never saw such 
a crowd before. . . . They really seem to think that 
the country is rescued from some dreadful danger." 
Sumner, the unsympathetic biographer of Jackson, 
says of the election of 1828, that it seemed truly 
to many Democrats, a rising of the people "in their 
might to overthrow an extravagant, corrupt, aris- 
tocratic, federalist administration, which had 
encroached on the liberties of the people," yet 
history adjudges the preceding administration of 
John Quincy Adams, as one of the purest, 
politically, ever known to us. 

I attempt no examination of the many rivulets 
of interests and emotions that merged in the great 



136 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

stream of this new democratic vision. All that I 
can do here is to name a few of the larger tribu- 
taries. The bulk of Jackson's support came from 
the West, where equality had long existed, and from 
the Eastern cities, where it was desired. The new 
Democratic party, casting off the supremacy of 
intellectual leadership in the old, was a "poor man's 
party" — as Schouler has described it. The belief 
was widespread that an aristocracy had ruled this 
nation and that its support of democracy was but 
a false profession to delude the people. The West 
asserted that equality of opportunity in occupying 
public lands was denied it by the East. There was 
everywhere a spirit of revolt from tradition and 
authority. These were a few of the main sources 
of the new democracy. But running through each 
and all of these was a new vision of democracy, — 
an assertion that the people had never yet ruled 
themselves, that they were now to do so, that this 
rule of the average man necessarily must result 
not merely in better, but in a perfect government. 
The ideals of Jeffersonian democracy were pri- 
marily political. Those of Jacksonian democracy 
were both political and social, and in the newer, 
America, professing allegiance to equality, came 
closer to the French conception of democracy, — 
stated in terms of "liberty, equality, and fraternity," 
though to the majority of men, fraternity held but 
a vague meaning, since it seemed uncalled for in 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 137 

this "land of opportunity." Jeffersonian democracy 
held no thesis of social perfection. The new 
democracy, though sprouting from the older, was 
less an emergence than a new birth, for it elevated 
the form of government to an ideal that would 
assure both political and social Utopia. 

After 1840, except for a few protesting voices, 
this new conception of the destiny of democracy 
was well-nigh universal in American life. America 
swelled with pride in the belief that she alone had 
solved the problem of human happiness under 
government, and that she led the world in ideals. 
As immigrants from foreign lands, driven by 
hunger in Ireland or by political oppression in 
Germany, poured into the country, America ex- 
panded the vision of her democracy into a haven 
of refuge, where all the races of the world might 
share in her peace and prosperity. Bryant's poem, 
"Oh Mother of a Mighty Race," expressed this 
vision : 

" There's freedom at thy gates and rest 
For earth's down-trodden and opprest, 
A shelter for the hunted head, 
For the starved laborer toil and bread. 

Power, at thy bounds, 
Stops and calls back his baffled hounds." 

Whenever a people rejoice in the conviction that 
they are a favored people, occupying the summit of 



138 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

civilization, they are inspired by their very supe- 
riority to show their preeminence in every possible 
way. The period of the forties, says Commons in his 
History of American Industrial Society, was that 
in which American fads and reforms ran riot. In 
every city there were weekly meetings of societies 
advocating anti-slavery, temperance, graham bread, 
prison reform, woman's suffrage, dress reform, 
"diffusion of bloomers," spiritualism, land re- 
form, — while Brook Farm, Mormonism, Owenism 
attracted less numerous, but equally enthusiastic 
followers. "It was," he asserts, "the golden age 
of the talk-fest, the lyceum, the brotherhood of 
man, — the 'hot air' period of American history." 
But we should also note that it was the period of 
an outburst of intellectual and spiritual ideals of 
permanent force and value. American literature, 
for example, flowered in the forties, in the new 
sense of American nationality and idealism. Spo- 
radic and temporary reform movements always 
appear in the whirlpool of a new national enthu- 
siasm. Gradually the froth disappears, while the 
deep current moves on. For a time manifest des- 
tiny was at the surface, then anti-slavery replaced 
it, while far down, more dense in volume, lay the 
sense of nationality and religion, permeated with 
an ideal vision of democracy. 

In the first lecture of this series, I stated that it 
was the ideal of nationality, which stood suddenly 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 139 

revealed in all its power, by the attack on Fort 
Sumter, uniting the North. But in the Civil War, 
though less clearly recognized, there was also a 
conflict between two ideals of democracy. We in 
America understood this but dimly, while to the 
interested English observer it seemed very clear. 
The South held the theory of a democracy of wise 
men, that is, in practice, of an intellectual aris- 
tocracy, — directly opposed to the Northern ideal of 
a government of average men. Also America had 
so boasted its superiority in government that the 
mere disruption of the Union seemed to deny the 
efficacy of democratic institutions. The crisis in 
America was thus of intense interest to English- 
men in its relation to their own problems of political 
organization, for just as the war began, the pressure 
of a reform party, largely basing its arguments on 
the success of democracy in America, was beginning 
to threaten the supremacy of an aristocratic govern- 
ment, not altered since the Reform Bill of 1832. 
Thus Englishmen had a domestic political interest 
in our struggle, defended their views according to 
that interest, and clearly expressed their sense that 
"democracy was on trial." At first confident that 
the North could never conquer the South, aristo- 
cratic sentiment was later made anxious by the 
campaigns on the Mississippi, and when the news 
came that Sherman had reached the sea at Savan- 
nah, the editor of the London Times^ Delane, fore- 



140 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

seeing the victory of the North, and dreading the 
influence on English poHtics, wrote to the prime 
minister, Palmerston, "The American news is a 
heavy blow to us as well as to the South." Lord 
Acton, clinging to the vision of a government of 
the wise, wrote, *T broke my heart over the sur- 
render of Lee." On the other hand, John Bright, 
radical advocate of a British expansion of the 
franchise, deserted his seat in parliament to tour 
the country, seeking to arouse sympathy with the 
North, and picturing the struggle in America as one 
which involved the future of the democratic prin- 
ciple. He appealed especially to the starving cotton 
operatives of Lancashire, and they gave evidence of 
their faith by refraining from a turbulence that 
might have encouraged the English government to 
interfere on the side of the South. Karl Marx 
labored among the workmen of London for like 
reasons. The personality of Lincoln soon assumed 
to Englishmen the significance of a political demon- 
stration. If a man sprung from the crudest sur- 
roundings, with no education, no heritage of 
administrative powers, uncouth in appearance, 
hitherto unskilled in the conduct of affairs of state, 
could guide a nation safely through the stress of a 
civil war, then indeed democracy would have proved 
its value. So at least argued English observers. 
To the English governing classes, Lincoln, — the real 
Lincoln, — was a myth. English credulity could not 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 141 

go so far as to accept, or comprehend, such a man. 
Punch, in numerous cartoons, exhibited him, first 
as the incompetent fool striving to be a man, later, 
when his strength became clear, as a despot crush- 
ing the liberties of America. But when our soldiers 
North and South, after Lee's surrender, hastened to 
resume their former occupations, prophecies of a 
military despotism were set at naught, the force of 
the ideal of democracy was fully recognized, and 
Lincoln came to be regarded as its highest, its 
marvelous demonstration. Four lines of Tom 
Taylor's beautiful poem in Punch, — his recantation 
for four years of injustice to Lincoln, — sum up the 
new British comprehension: 

" Yes, he had lived to shame me from my sneer, 
To lame my pencil, and confute my pen — 
To make me own this hind of princes peer. 
This rail splitter a true born King of men." 

England believed, then, what we did not clearly 
understand, that the war was a contest between two 
differing ideals of democracy, and involved the fate 
of the democratic form of government as well. As 
to the last, I think England unduly magnified the 
possible results of the conflict. Our very lack of 
any feeling that democratic government was at 
stake is evidence of its complete obsession amongst 
us. Both during and after the war we simply took 
democracy for granted, and rested secure in the 



142 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

faith that our form of government, a divinely 
ordained machine, would correct all evils. 

All ideals shared in the intellectual and moral 
lethargy of the next period, and politics, in which 
ideals find their most far-reaching expression, fell, 
by the neglect of the duties of citizenship, into the 
hands of men not representative of a living democ- 
racy. The "boss," to the dismay of America, 
assumed a power and proportions hitherto un- 
known, but we were long in waking to his real 
significance in the theory of democracy. Still 
enthralled with the vision of democracy as Utopia, 
where, without effort in citizenship, the mere accept- 
ance of a right theory of government must work 
right, America merely smiled at Lowell's epigram 
on "The Boss" : 

" Skilled to pull wires, he baffles Nature's hope, 
Who sure intended him to stretch a rope." 

America listened respectfully to Huxley's sharp 
criticism in his farewell speech at New York, but 
his caution, "eternal suspicion is the price of 
liberty," was soon forgotten in the flood tide of 
industrial prosperity. 

The first note of doubt in this peaceful and pas- 
sive confidence in an ideal was aroused by the 
inrush of a new immigration, more difficult of 
absorption than the old. Aldrich, in his poem 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 143 

"Unguarded Gates," gave warning of perils hitherto 
unheeded. 

" O Liberty, white Goddess ! is it well 
To leave the gates unguarded? On thy breast 
Fold Sorrow's children, soothe the hurts of fate, 
Lift the down-trodden, but with hands of steel 
Stay those who to thy sacred portals come 
To waste the gifts of freedom. Have a care 
Lest from thy brow the clustered stars be torn 
And trampled in the dust. For so of old 
The thronging Goth and Vandal trampled Rome, 
And where the temples of the Caesars stood 
The lean wolf unmolested made her lair." 

By 1890, American apathy had disappeared. 
Aroused by the problem of this new immigration,— 
with that great solvent, the public land, exhausted,— 
with new and unexpected transformations in the 
industrial world,— above all, with a new generation 
of citizens, seeking again, as had their fathers in 
their youth, ideals by which to guide their conduct, 
the nation awakened from the dream that democ- 
racy, without effort, cures all ills. 

The first result of this rude awakening was 
reaction against the ideal itself. The vision had 
failed in part,— it must be altogether wrong. In its 
place was raised the ideal of "good administration," 
which, let it be established by whatever manipula- 
tion, even trickery, was justified of its works. 
Though proclaimed discreetly, this was but the old 



144 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

ideal of government by the wisest, — an ideal whose 
fatal defect is that it must, in the end, be main- 
tained by despotic force. Nor was the reaction 
against democracy confined to America. Since the 
middle of the nineteenth century, Europe also had 
professed her faith in the vision, and yet had seen 
new times give birth to new evils. In England, 
especially, popular self-government, manhood suf- 
frage, had been preached as a panacea for national 
diseases, and beginning with the Reform Bill of 
1867, the solution of every difficulty had been 
sought in a farther expansion of the franchise. The 
ardent political reformers of the mid-century them- 
selves believed, and imposed their faith upon the 
nation, that popular government assured perfection. 
Failing to realize a perfect society, these same lead- 
ers, their youthful dreams shattered, sounded the 
note of distrust in their own earlier ideals. Permit 
me to expand and restate this general reaction by 
paraphrase and citation from the Dodge Lectures 
of 1908 by Mr. Bryce. This distinguished publicist 
there traces the history of the ideal of democracy, 
stating that in the later eighteenth century, and the 
earlier nineteenth, there was in America a devoted 
faith in government of the people by the people. 
In spite of those who doubted, and whose doubts 
placed in our constitution checks upon hastily con- 
sidered popular action, this faith became a creed. 
It produced in America a great sympathy with the 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 145 

European revolutions of 1830 and 1848. In Europe 
itself there was passionate expression of belief in 
a democracy that would secure "a reign of brother- 
hood and peace, an age of tranquil prosperity and 
assured order." Since 1870, says Mr. Bryce, there 
has been reaction. Even though conditions of life 
and happiness have undoubtedly improved, there 
has been disappointment. The ills of society under 
other governmental forms have, indeed, disap- 
peared, but new ills have replaced them. "The 
citizens have failed to respond to the demand for 
active virtue and intelligent public spirit which free 
government makes and must make. Everywhere 
there is the same contrast between that which the 
theory of democracy requires and that which the 
practice of democracy reveals." It is, he continues, 
the "average man" who is responsible. "The gov- 
ernment is his. Officials are only his agents, work- 
ing under his eye. The principles of a democracy 
ascribe and must ascribe to him the supreme and 
final voice in the conduct of public affairs. He can 
not disclaim his responsibility without the risk of 
forfeiting his rights." 

These are wise words addressed to young men 
about to assume the duties of citizenship, but in 
one respect I think they are in error. They still 
proclaim the vision of an impossible democracy, — 
a vision of Utopia. "Everywhere," says Mr. 
Bryce, "there is the same contrast between that 



146 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

which the theory of democracy requires and that 
which the practice of democracy reveals." He, 
too, inspired in youth by a vision of governmental 
perfection, now experiences the reaction from 
failure to reach that goal. For many, such reaction 
results in outright pessimism. I well remember a 
conversation, some years ago, with one who, about 
1850, had been an enthusiast in the cause of a wider 
franchise in England. "Do you in America," he 
said, "still believe in democracy?" and then added, 
"I once had faith in it also." 

If this Utopian ideal of democracy is the thing 
to be tested, then, indeed "that which the theory of 
democracy requires" is sadly lacking in "that which 
the practice of democracy reveals." But there was 
a fallacy in the vision. It misled men, for there is 
no human perfection, and there is, and can be, no 
such thing on earth as perfect government. Society 
is an organism, changing, growing, putting off old 
forms, and putting on new ones. The true test 
of democracy is not fulfilment; it is progressive 
betterment. Let us return to the average man. 
Who that knows the history of Europe will deny 
that in intelligence, in humanity, in toleration, in 
sympathy, in physical comforts, in respect for the 
government under which he lives, — his own govern- 
ment, because he owns it, — the average man of the 
twentieth century is far superior to his brother of 
a hundred years ago? This is not to assert that 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 147 

these betterments are exclusively the products of 
democracy, but that under democracy they have 
grown with a rapidity unknown to any other form 
of governmental institutions. 

In America, up to 1870 at least, there was the 
same advance, after which there was a resting time 
in the world of spirit, partly due indeed to our very 
exaggeration of the ideal of democracy, — to our 
fallacious belief in an impossible vision. Today we 
see more clearly both the merits and the limitation 
of democracy. Political liberty, equality before the 
law, fraternity in human sympathy, we may hope 
to secure through government. Industrial liberty, 
equality of opportunity, must yield in part, at least, 
to the organic sense of the nation, — to fraternity. 
Political parties in America are today divided, in 
theory, by the differing limits they would place on 
industrial liberty and equality of opportunity, but 
they are in agreement that some limit is necessary, 
and the cause of this agreement is a higher appre- 
ciation of the ideal of fraternity.- This is our 
American conception of social democracy, but we 
no longer hold it perfect in itself, — it is but progress 
toward some unseen goal. Today, youth again 
asserting its faith in ideals, the nation reawakened, 
gropes to resume the path of betterment, and it has 
this advantage over an earlier time, that its view 
is clearer, its method more sane, since men, — even 
average men, — have cast aside the dream of democ- 



148 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

racy as the perfect state, but still cling to it, and 
exalt it in government, as the safest means of 
steady, peaceful advance. 

It is beyond the scope of this lecture, and beyond 
my privilege, to indicate the lines of this new ad- 
vance. There are many faiths, and as many 
priests, who would willingly serve as guides. On 
one basic principle all are united, — that democracy, 
long content to make liberty its one ideal, asserting 
the privilege and the rights of the individual in 
society, means today, rather, a conception of society 
where the ideal of fraternity rests side by side with 
that of liberty, where duty shares with rights. But 
my text has been simply the vision of democracy, 
and in tracing its advance in America, if I have 
denied it qualities ascribed to it in earlier times, it 
is because of faith in it as an ideal medium of 
development. My text is, then, "Faith in Democ- 
racy," not to be unfairly tested by the impossible 
standards of perfection, but judged as a progres- 
sively bettered organism, with a healthier body, a 
mind more open to reason, and a soul more 
sensitive to ideals. 

In concluding this, the last lecture on The Power 
of Ideals in American History, permit me a word 
in recapitulation. Some of the ideals I have touched 
upon are not now influential in national life. It 
would be idle today to appeal to anti-slavery senti- 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 149 

ment in the sense in which it was understood in 
the fifties. Manifest destiny, so far as the craze 
for territorial expansion is concerned, is fortu- 
nately no longer an obsession, though we wisely 
cling to belief in a high spiritual destiny. These 
ideals, as formerly expressed, were suited to par- 
ticular occasions, and have passed away. But this 
in no way weakens the statement of their force 
while they existed, nor lessens the truth of the 
conclusion that ideals have powerfully affected the 
course of our history. Indeed, one may go beyond 
this and, though proving by analysis and historical 
study that an ideal was conceived in error, and 
wrong in application, may yet postulate the political, 
even the moral, force of the ideal itself. This fact 
I have just attempted to make clear in relation to 
some supposed attributes of the ideal of democracy. 
Briefly, my purpose throughout has not been to pro- 
claim certain ideals as in themselves always 
admirable, but to assert their force, and by infer- 
ence to prove that since America has never been 
without ideals, she cannot today dispense with 
them. If this be accepted, it follows that every 
one, especially every young man, should feel the 
duty of self-examination, seeking to discover his 
own ideals and sentiments toward national prob- 
lems and personal life. Having so discovered them 
he must, if he be a real man, seek to translate them, 
into action. Thus fulfilling his duty as a citizen 



150 THE POWER OF IDEALS 

he will help to mould his country, and to preserve 
it from wreck in times of crisis. For it is in such 
times that ideals and sentiments rule, and decide 
the fate of peoples and of states. 

Three ideals treated in these lectures still live in 
America. Religion, a faith in divine purpose, finds 
satisfaction in this life, in service. It is the foun- 
tain head of all ideals, and we may state our belief 
with Lowell : "Moral supremacy is the only one that 
leaves monuments and not ruins behind it." 
DemoLtacy, not as Utopia but as the best method 
of steady progress, and with new emphasis upon 
fraternity, permeates our national consciousness. 
Nationality is still the most powerful political sen- 
timent in the United States, and in the whole world. 
Those who would discard it among the nations of 
the earth are visionary, for the time is so remote 
when the sentiment of nationality will have dis- 
appeared, as to be beyond the vision of the great 
mass of men. But nationality to us means more 
than union in government; it means union in all 
American ideals, the moral assets of the nation. 
With Longfellow we profess our faith: 

" Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! 
Sail on, O Union, strong and great! 
Humanity with all its fears. 
With all the hopes of future years, 
Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 



IN AMERICAN HISTORY 151 

Fear not each sudden sound and shock, 

'Tis of the wave and not the rock; 

'Tis but the flapping of the sail, 

And not a rent made by the gale ! 

In spite of rock and tempest's roar, 

In spite of false lights on the shore, 

Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! 

Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, 

Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears. 

Our faith triumphant o'er our fears. 

Are all with thee, — are all with thee." 



INDEX 



INDEX 

Adams, John Quincy, and right of petition, 49. 

Acton, Lord, on Lee's surrender, 140. 

Aldrich, Thomas Bailey, on immigration, 143. 

American Revolution, and nationality, 4. 

Ames, Fisher, on democracy, 133. 

Anti-slavery, and nationality, 15, 21; Iowa Band on, 114. 

Barry, WilHam, on American religion, 121. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, service of, in Civil War, 116. 

Beecher, Lyman, on America's inheritance, 82. 

Bogart, "keynote of American history," xi. 

Bright, John, and Civil War, 140. 

Bryant, William Cullen, on American freedom, 137. 

Bryce, James, on American excitability, 75 ; and democracy, 

144-146. 
Bushnell, Horace, on the "economic man," xii. 
Calhoun, and nullification, 8; on liberty, 9, 14; and Texas, 

81. 
Canadian rebellion of 1837, and manifest destiny, 74-79. 
"Caroline Affair," 76. 

Central America, plans of American expansion in, 89. 
Civil War, and nationality, 14, 27; and manifest destiny, 

91; and religion, 116; and democracy, 139. 
Clay, Henry, on American power, 88. 
Clergy, leadership of, in civic life, 97, 104, 122; of the 

West and slavery, 114. 
Commons, John Rogers, on America in the forties, 138. 
Compromise of 1850, 52. 
Cotton mills, and anti-slavery, 47. 
Cranch, Christopher, on divine guidance, 123. 
Crandall, Miss, girls' school and anti-slavery, 42. 
Cushing, on British encroachment, 78. 



156 INDEX 

Davis, Jefferson, on Declaration of Independence, 56; 
inaugural speech, 57. 

Declaration of Independence, Davis on, 56; quoted, 129; 
signers' idea of, 129. 

Delane, John Thaddeus, on Sherman's March, 140. 

Democracy, American, Lieut. Governor Head on, 11; and 
monarchy, 81; and Europe, 88; and Unitarianism, 100; 
and religious ideals, 107; new vision of, in 1830, 136. 
reaction against, 143-146. 

Dickens, Charles, on American bombast, 90. 

Divine purpose, American faith in, 122. 

Dwight, Timothy, on constitutional convention of 1787, 4. 

Elliot, Charles, British agent in Texas, efforts of, 80; on 
American energy, 81. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, on effect of Sumter, 20; on aboli- 
tion, 46. 

England, American feeling against, 69; Cushing on en- 
croachment of, 78; and Texas, 79; Calhoun on, 81; 
interest in Civil War, 139; Reform Bill of 1867, 144. 

Federal taxation, and nationality, 7. 

Fiske, John, on Jefferson, 132. 

Fraternity, and democracy, 147. 

Garrison, William Lloyd, on slavery, 36-38; church oppo- 
sition to, 40; advocates northern secession, 40; Inde- 
pendence Day speech, 51. 

Gilder, Joseph, on American duty, 94. 

"Good Administration," and democracy, 143. 

Greeley, Horace, on Oregon, 84. 

Hale, Edward Everett, "The Man Without a Country," 27. 

Hall, Captain Basil, on American feeling against England, 
69; on democracy, 134. 

Hammond, Governor, on slave labor, 52. 

Head, Lieut. Governor, on American democracy, 11 . 

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, on secession of South Carolina, 
16. 



INDEX 157 

Home Missions, and nationality, 103, 109. 

Hooker, Thomas, on democratic government, 99. 

Howe, Julia Ward, ''Battle Hymn of Republic," 22. 

Hughes, Charles Evans, on democracy, 127. 

Humor, American, and manifest destiny, 90. 

Ideals, seeming lack of, in America, 117, 142; pulpit leader- 
ship in, 119; revival of, 119, 143, 147; democratic, 136; 
confusion of, 138; present-day American, 149. 

Immigration, and democracy, 137; Bryant on, 137; Aldrich 
on, 143. 

Iowa Band, 110. 

Jackson, Andrew, on nullification, 12; and democracy, 135; 
compared with Jefiferson, 136. 

Jefferson, Thomas, theory of democracy, 130-133; inaugu- 
ral address, 131; and rule of the majority, 132; Fiske 
on, 132; democracy of, compared with Jacksonian, 136. 

Kansas-Nebraska question, effect of, 53. 

King, Thomas Starr, service of, in Civil War, 116. 

Liberty, Washington on, 5. 

Lieber, Francis, on Panama Canal, 89. 

Lincoln, on emancipation, 23; election of, in 1860, 55; Eng- 
lish view of, 140; and democracy, 140; Punch's recan- 
tation on, 141. 

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, on ideal of nationality, 
150. 

Lowell, James Russell, on Mexican War, 15; triumph of 
ideals, 16; slavery, 21; Mexican War, 52; on manifest 
destiny, 93; on the "boss," 142; on "moral supremacy," 
150. 

Lounsbury, Thomas Raynesford, on effect of Sumter, 17. 

Mackay, Charles, on English and American destinies, 91. 

McDuffie, Governor, on slavery and democracy, 48; on 
Oregon, 83. 

McKinley, William, on American destiny, 92. 

Marx, Karl, and Civil War, 140. 



158 INDEX 

Materialistic historians, x-xiii; and anti-slavery, 33-35, 
59; and westward movement, 65. 

Mexican War, and anti-slavery, 51. 

Militant patriotism, against England, 69. 

Moore, Thomas, on American Revolution, x. 

Monroe Doctrine, and nationality, 6. 

Nationality, and anti-slavery, 47; and manifest destiny, 
68; and militant patriotism, 69; and Home Missions, 
103; great power of, 150. 

Nullification and nationality, 8. 

Oberlin College, and anti-slavery, 39. 

Oregon, Dickerson on, 71; Benton on, 72; and Polk's cam- 
paign, 81; compromise on, 83; McDuffie on, 83; Gree- 
ley on, 84; New York Herald on, 85. 

Paine, Thomas, influence of, in America, 128; Cheetham 
on, 128; Randolph on, 128. 

Phillips Andover Academy, and anti-slavery, 43. 

Phillips, Wendell, on ideals in Civil War, 59. 

Pike, Albert, "Dixie," 25. 

Proctor, Edna Dean, "John Brown," 22. 

Pulpit, and idealism, 119. 

Religious ideals, and manifest destiny, 68; and national 
ideals, 101, 103; and democracy, 107; influence of the 
West, 108-115; force of, reviewed, 120-124. 

Schurz, Carl, on effect of Sumter, 19. 

Service, the doctrine of, 119, 147. 

Seward, William H., on American idealism, 53. 

Simons, class interests, XI. 

South, nationality developed by Civil War, 25. 

Spanish-American War, and manifest destiny, 92. 

Stephens, Alexander, inaugural speech on slavery, 58. 

Sumner, William, on election of Jackson, 135. 

Sumter, attack on, and nationality, 16, 20. 

Tariff, and nationality, 7; of 1828, 8. 

Texas, and manifest destiny, 79. 



INDEX 159 

Timrod, Henry, "Cotton Boll," 26. 

Thompson^ George, at Phillips Andover Academy, 43; and 

Boston riot of 1835, 46. 
Todd, John, sermon of, 103. 
Unitarianism, and democracy, 100; Jefferson on, 101; and 

liberty, 102. 
Utopia, democracy does not insure, 145. 
War of 1812, and nationality, 5. 
Warburton, Eliot, on American destiny, 87. 
Washington, George, on virtue in politics, 98. 
Webster, Daniel, on nullification, 10. 
Westward movement, essence of, 65; progress of, 70; in 

relation to Texas, 74; poem on opportunity of, 86; 

and democracy, 136. 
Whittier, John Greenleaf, on abolition, 41; on Mexican 

War, 51; on Kansas emigration, 54. 
Wilson, Woodrow, on westward movement, 65. 
Yale, Elihu, lines on tomb of, 124. 



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